RSS

Tag Archives: suspense

Review – Got Game? – Stephanie Doyle (@StephDoyleRW)

29 Nov

Got Game?
Author: Stephanie Doyle

Book Description:
Oh, Yeah. Game On! The world of professional golf is rocked when the new ranking system allows Reilly Carr – the country’s best female player–to compete with the big boys. Now everyone wants to know if she will or won’t play in golf’s premier event…The American.

But her tough choices are complicated further when Luke Nolan – her on again, off again lover – suddenly decides now is the time to turn their friends-with-benefits set up into a real relationship!

If she’s going to make the cut she’ll need to battle her game, the press and most of all her heart. The stakes have never been higher.

Review:
I have to say upfront that I loved Reilly as a character – she was a tough, no nonsense, work her ass off kind of girl. Having worked in a male dominated career for the last eight years, and dealing with people who try to skate because of certain characteristics – I find that i am often drawn to characters i books that reflect more of what I would like to see – in this case, a woman who shows the guys how it is done. True, she won’t ever be able to completely match them, but getting out there and doing her best is what I liked.

I liked how the relationship between her and Luke was re-kindled (since I am a sucker for young love rekindled). Although her brother and best friend drove me a bit nuts. The whole bickering, make-up, break-up thing just doesn’t do it for me. So i’m glad that everything worked out on that side of the house in the end.

I have to admit that I kind of figured out the suspense angle before it was revealed, but i think that the author did a good job of making it obvious without being too much so (if that makes sense…). I’ll definately be looking forward to reading more books by Ms Doyle in the future (can’t remember off the top of my head, if i have read any by her in the past or not…). Solid 3.5 stars overall.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on November 29, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

Review – Dead Ringer – Allen Wyler

23 Nov

Dead Ringer
Author: Allen Wyler

Review Copy provided by Blue Dot Literary

Book Description:
While speaking at a Hong Kong medical conference, neurosurgeon Dr. Lucas McCrae slips the cloth off a cadaver’s head during a routine medical demonstration, and is overwhelmed with the shock by what’s staring back at him: His best friend, Andy Baer.
Stunned, McCrae races back to Seattle to discover that Andy is in fact missing and may have been murdered by a gang of body snatchers who operate a legit funeral business and make a fortune by selling recovered body parts to medical researchers.

McCrae teams up with an unlikely pair—a beautiful but hardnosed female cop and a gang member whose family was victimized by the body parts ring—to try and expose a macabre web of corruption that involves law enforcement, politicians, funeral home curators and murdered prostitutes.

Review
After reading a previous book by Allen Wyler (Dead End Deal), I was impressed by the medical technique and familiarity that he brought to the storyline. In Dead Ringer, he managed to do that once again. Reading the description of Dead Ringer, I was like, the name of the main character (Lucas McCrae) sounds familiar, and then I realized that his name had been used as a cameo in Dead End Deal – so I liked how the author was able to tie to two books together though similar characters, without making them a true series.

But this book was for me, so much freakier than Dead End Deal. I have been an organ donor since I got my license nearly 15 years ago, and while I had thought about how my organs might be used, should anything ever happen to me – the depravity of the antagonist opened my eyes. I had read/heard about bad market deals with organs, so it didn’t really surprise me that there were ones for dead bodies as well – but wow, that’s about all I can say. I think that the author managed to walk the fine line between being dramatic, and cheesy – although, there were a few moments where I was like, uhhh ok…and personally, I felt that everything tied up in a pretty bow almost too easy…but I’m sure others would disagree with me.

I’m definitely interested in seeing more of what he writes in the future. Overall 3.5 stars.

Purchase from Amazon here: Dead Ringer (Print) or Dead Ringer (Kindle)

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on November 23, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

Audiobook Review – Ice Cold – Tess Gerritsen

07 Nov

Ice Cold
Author: Tess Gerritsen
Series: #8 in the Rizzoli and Isles series

Narrator: Tanya Eby
Run Time: 9 hrs 51 minutes
Producer: Brilliance Audio

Book Description:
In Wyoming for a medical conference, Boston medical examiner Maura Isles joins a group of friends on a spur-of-the-moment ski trip. But when their SUV stalls on a snow-choked mountain road, they’re stranded with no help in sight.

As night falls, the group seeks refuge from the blizzard in the remote village of Kingdom Come, where twelve eerily identical houses stand dark and abandoned. Something terrible has happened in Kingdom Come: Meals sit untouched on tables, cars are still parked in garages. The town’s previous residents seem to have vanished into thin air, but footprints in the snow betray the presence of someone who still lurks in the cold darkness—someone who is watching Maura and her friends.

Days later, Boston homicide detective Jane Rizzoli receives the grim news that Maura’s charred body has been found in a mountain ravine. Shocked and grieving, Jane is determined to learn what happened to her friend. The investigation plunges Jane into the twisted history of Kingdom Come, where a gruesome discovery lies buried beneath the snow. As horrifying revelations come to light, Jane closes in on an enemy both powerful and merciless—and the chilling truth about Maura’s fate.

Review
I figure after greatly enjoying the last few books in the series, I was about due for a dud. But even saying that, Ms Gerritsen’s dud’s are still better than a good majority of other fiction out there (oh the irony). I can’t even really describe what it was about this one that made it only ehhh for me – I think it was because I had pretty much figured out the who done it early-ish in the book (like not long after the introduction of said character). I also think that it might be the fact that one of the things I love the best about the series is the interaction between Jane and Maura and that was decidedly lacking in this series as they spent 90% of the series separated by several thousand miles. It made me realize how much Jane is the dominant character in the series – while Maura has this quiet strength and perseverance, which was highlighted in this book – Jane is like the gun powder – explosive and on the go. Which is what I prefer – maybe because she is opposite to me – I definitely identify more with Maura than with Jane, which is why I like reading about Jane’s antics. The one interesting thing for me in this book was how various cult’s and the development of Cult’s were discussed. It made me want to read more about some of the ones that have become famous in history (Jonestown specifically), so I am on the look-out for books (if anyone has any ideas – let me know).

Going into the narration, I wasn’t sure what I was going to think of Tanya Eby’s work. I had heard a few negative reviews about some of her work and I was a bit worried – but I was pleasantly surprised. I can’t say that this was my favorite narration ever, because its not, and it definately wasn’t my favorite of the series (Anna Fields has that spot all tied up), but it was enjoyable. One of the comments other listeners had made was on a lisp – but I didn’t hear anything that wasn’t easily gotten used to in listening. However, I wasn’t a fan of how Jane sounded in her parts – she didn’t have the Boston Irish accent that I had gotten used to in previous narrations, so that was lacking. However, I didn’t mind her narration of Jane and thought that she did a pretty good job with the narration of the various males voices that occurred through-out.

Overall, I would give both the book and the narration 3 stars. I liked it, but didn’t love it. It will be interesting to see how I enjoy the narration in future books, as it appears that Tanya Eby may become the primarily narrator (she has done the two most recent books).

 
2 Comments

Posted by on November 7, 2012 in Audiobook Review

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Audiobook Review – The Stonecutter – Camilla Läckberg

10 Sep

The Stonecutter
Author: Camilla Läckberg
Series: #3 in the Patrik Hedström series

Narrator: David Thorn
Run Time: 16 hours and 58 minutes

Review Copy Provided by Audiobook Jukebox and Highbridge Audio

Book Description: The remote resort of Fjallbacka has seen its share of tragedy, though perhaps none worse than that of the little girl found in a fisherman’s net. But the post-mortem reveals that this is no case of accidental drowning!

Local detective Patrik Hedstrom has just become a father. It is his grim task to discover who could be behind the methodical murder of a child both he and his partner, Erica, knew well. He knows the real question – and answer – lies with why. What he does not know is how this case will reach into the dark heart of Fjallbacka and the town’s past, and tear aside its idyllic facade, perhaps forever.

Review:
I have to admit that I was a bit skeptical at first when I started The Stonecutter as to if I would enjoy it or not. I had previously tried several times to listen to the first book in the series and kept getting distracted – so I didn’t know if it was an issue with the author, the audio, or the fact that I was trying to listen to it at work. And normally, I am a stickler for listening to series books in order, especially ones like The Stonecutter where many of the same characters re-appear and the relationships develop through-out the books. But after talking to one of my friends who had read all three books in the series, she told me that I should be ok to listen to The Stonecutter without too much trouble and then went on to say that it was her favorite in the series to date. I’m glad that I listened to her advice and now I am debating going back and trying to listen to the previous two, because I am curious enough about the some of the things that were mentioned in this third book to know the context in which they originally occurred.

There were lots of twists and turns presented during the book, and at one stage, I thought I had the who done it, narrowed down to one of three people, but to my surprise when I did finally figure it out, it wasn’t any of the people I was expecting. Läckberg did a great job of laying a foundation of multiple people playing a role in the crime where it could have easily have been any one of several people. I also liked the fact, as with other Nordic authors, the case isn’t presented as a wham bam solve it in one day, but rather it is extended, many different people get questioned and mistakes are made. I also found that the transition between the past and the present flowed relatively smoothly once I got used to it and I could easily see that the chronological progression of the sections from the past meant that it was going to be significant in the ultimately solving of the crime.

Unlike many of the books that fall within the Nordic Noir genre, Camilla Läckberg tends to place a bit more of a focus on the character interactions and relationships, as well as the solving of the crime. At times this was a bit distracting and it felt to me like everyone had some kind of psychological issue (and that I could have been reading symptoms in the DSV-IV). But ultimately many of these issues ended up playing kind of a role in the development of the crime and the eventual solving of it. I wasn’t necessarily a fan of some of the secondary characters and felt that there was some extraneous plots going on (Erica’s sister for one), but with how the book concluded, I think those are going to play a role in later books in the series.

This is the first time that I had listened to a narration by David Thorn (aside from my failed attempt with The Ice Princess which didn’t have anything to do with him as I reflect back). But it won’t be the last. For the most part, I thought he did a good job with the various voices, in particular the male characters. His female voices tended to be weaker than the male ones but that didn’t really surprise me at all. He managed to maintain the continuity of the narration through-out and it was an easy listen.

The production by Highbridge Audio was really good and I didn’t have any complaints about the quality. Just one of my tiny pet peeves is that I like it when CD’s end at the end of a chapter because I routinely try to finish listening to the current chapter on my commute to work in the mornings (or afternoons) and have been known to sit in my car to finish up one – but that is really hard to do if the chapter doesn’t end with the CD – but that is probably just a personal pet peeve of mine and may not bug others.

Overall, I’d give the story a 3.5 and the narration a 4.5 – so an overall score of 4 stars for the book. I’m looking forward to re-trying the earlier books in the series and seeing where she goes in the future.

 
2 Comments

Posted by on September 10, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Review – The Keepsake – Tess Gerritsen

01 Sep

The Keepsake
Author: Tess Gerritsen
Series: #7 in the Rizzoli and Isles series

Narrator: Diedre Lovejoy
Run Time: 10 hrs and 51 minutes

Book Description:
For untold years, the perfectly preserved mummy had lain forgotten in the dusty basement of Boston’s Crispin Museum. Now its sudden rediscovery by museum staff is both a major coup and an attention-grabbing mystery. Dubbed “Madam X,” the mummy–to all appearances, an ancient Egyptian artifact– seems a ghoulish godsend for the financially struggling institution. But medical examiner Maura Isles soon discovers a macabre message hidden within the corpse–horrifying proof that this “centuries-old” relic is instead a modern-day murder victim.

To Maura and Boston homicide detective Jane Rizzoli, the forensic evidence is unmistakable, its implications terrifying. And when the grisly remains of yet another woman are found in the hidden recesses of the museum, it becomes chillingly clear that a maniac is at large–and is now taunting them.
Archaeologist Josephine Pulcillo’s blood runs cold when the killer’s cryptic missives are discovered, and her darkest dread becomes real when the carefully preserved corpse of yet a third victim is left in her car like a gruesome offering–or perhaps a ghastly promise of what’s to come.

Review:
Of all the books in the Rizzoli and Isles series that I have listened to this year, The Keepsake is one of my favorites. I loved how a museum, a place where many people wouldn’t necessarily choose to visit (unless you are a history dork like me!) as an option when visiting a new city. And yet, Ms Gerritsen wrote this book in a way that I hope will cause more people to choose to visit them. And added to that, there was the egyptology twist with mummies and artifacts. The various dead methods that the author choose to incorporate into the plot with the Archeology killer were particularly gruesome and unique from all the other books in the series. After finishing this book, I wanted to pick up a book about egyptian burial methods to read up on my history. To me, that is a sign of a good book, when I want to find a non-fiction book about something that was featured in a fiction book.

After listening to most of the books in the series so far, and playing the musical narrators for most of the books (I think Deidre Lovejoy is the 5th different one maybe), I have come to appreciate the different narration skills out there. For me, this was a solid performance. I can’t say that it completely blew me away, but I rather enjoyed it and it made my commute go a lot quicker for the 4 and a half days that it took me to complete it. I downloaded this from my library via the overdrive app, so I have no complaints about the production of it and didn’t notice any issues with the recording.

The Keepsake: A Rizzoli & Isles Novel (Rizzoli & Isles Novels) (Paperback)
The Keepsake: A Rizzoli & Isles Novel (Jane Rizzoli & Maura Isles) (Kindle)

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on September 1, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

Review – The Missing – Chris Mooney

31 Jul

The Missing
Author: Chris Mooney
Series: Book 1 in the Darby McCormick series

Narrator: Bernadette Dunne
Run Time: 8hrs 23 minutes

Book Description:
Darby McCormack was in high school when she first encountered the killer: someone murdered a woman in the woods where Darby and her two best friends were partying. His race to silence the witnesses was sure-footed and violent – but somehow Darby survived.
Twenty-five years later, Darby is a crime-scene investigator for the Boston Police Department, and a chilling case – a woman’s late-night abduction – has her uncovering strange leads to missing women, past and present. As forensic clues lead her closer to a psychopath called the Traveler, Darby must finally resolve the nightmare of her past and come face-to-face with a killer who is determined to keep the missing – and the horrors they endured at his hands – from ever coming to light.

Review
I likely never would have picked up this book if I hadn’t been playing around with a book recommendation book online. The Missing showed up as a book that readers who enjoyed Shadow Man by Cody MacFayden and since I enjoyed that one, I figured that I would try it. It also worked well because I am making it a goal of mine to try a wider range of audiobook narrators rather than sticking to my tried and true favorites and I had never listened to the narrator before.

Similar to Shadow Man, The Missing focuses on a female mc who has suffered a tragedy in her life – this one when she was a teenager. (But as a random thought, why is it that so many female main characters in these mystery/thriller/suspense books have suffered some kind of massive tragedy that makes them a crusader for good, why can’t they just choose to do that…but that is a thought for another time). Anyways, back to the book – Darby is now a crime scene investigator and solving current crimes as well as the one from her past.

At first I thought I had figured out who the bad guy was going to be, but I completely discounted the person who it turned out to be – you know, one of these days, i’ll start listening to the little voice on my shoulder. I am kind of tempted to re-listen in the future and see if I feel differently.

This was the first time that I had listened to Bernadette Dunne as a narrator and it likely won’t be the last. I felt that she had a good range of vocal inflections for the various voices – but at the same time – the cast of the book was rather limited as compared to other ones I have listened to, so I don’t know how she would have done with a wider range of characters, but I’ll be looking out for more done narrated by her in the future.

 
4 Comments

Posted by on July 31, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , ,

Review – Shadow Man – Cody McFadyen

05 Jul

Shadow Man
Author: Cody McFadyen
Series: #1 in the Smoky Barrett

Narrator: Kate Reading
Run Time: 13 hours, 14 minutes

Book Description
Once, Special Agent Smoky Barrett hunted serial killers for the FBI. She was one of the best–until a madman terrorized her family, killed her husband and daughter, and left her face scarred and her soul brutalized. Turning the tables on the killer, Smoky shot him dead–but her life was shattered forever.

Now Smoky dreams about picking up her weapon again. She dreams about placing the cold steel between her lips and pulling the trigger one last time. Because for a woman who’s lost everything, what is there left to lose?

She’s about to find out.

In all her years at the Bureau, Smoky has never encountered anyone like him–a new and fascinating kind of monster, a twisted genius who defies profilers’ attempts to understand him. And he’s issued Smoky a direct challenge, coaxing her back from the brink with the only thing that could convince her to live.

The killer videotaped his latest crime–an act of horror that left a child motherless–then sent a message addressed to Agent Smoky Barrett. The message is enough to shock Smoky back to work, back to her FBI team. And that child awakens something in Smoky she thought was gone forever.

Suddenly the stakes are raised. The game has changed. For as this deranged monster embarks on an unspeakable spree of perversion and murder, Smoky is coming alive again–and she’s about to face her greatest fears as a cop, a woman, a mother…and a merciless killer’s next victim.

Review
I’ll have to admit, at first when I started listening to Shadow Man, I was skeptical. The first hour or so that I listened to, I was a bit confused over what was going on but that soon changed. I was glad that I was listening to this at work, because I could easily stop when I was at a more suspenseful part and take a break (aka, go and bug my co-workers) before resuming the listening. The author has a way with his writing that made me feel as though I was with Smoky as she was dealing with the crimes perpetrated by the killer. In this instance, I had an inkling of who I thought the killer was, but nothing was clear up until the final reveal and then it was a definate ah-ha moment.

I enjoyed Kate Reading’s narration – to my knowledge, I don’t think that I have ever listened to anything that she has narrated before. I know that I will def. look out for more stuff done by her in the future and will be continuing this series for sure (I already have the next one on my queue at booksfree.com). I would likely never have picked up this book to listen to if it hadn’t show up on the list of books that readers who enjoyed Vanish (Tess Gerritsen) also enjoyed and I am glad that I did.

 
1 Comment

Posted by on July 5, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Review – Dead End Deal – Allen Wyler

04 Jun

Review Copy Provided by the Publisher

When I look back at the books I have read over the last year, there has been a pretty clear shift from the romances that I used to read, almost to the exclusion of everything else, to my rather diverse reading fare, a lot of while you see mentioned on my blog. If the publisher of Dead End Deal had asked me a year ago, I probably would not have agreed to review it and that would have been a mistake.

I was immediately draw into the story of Jon Ritter who is a neuro-surgeon working towards a cure for Alzheimer’s, as well as other forms of dementia through the use of stem cells. Having following the various controversies regarding stem cell research over the last few years, I realized that I really knew nothing about it, and so entering the world created by Allen Wyler, I was immediately sucked in. As I was reading, my first through was wow, he sure knows a lot about neurosurgery and upon googling his name, I found out why, he is a Doctor in his own right.

The book brought up some interesting ideas about the use of stem cells, how pharmaceutical companies influence funding towards drugs, and what would happen if a cure was really discovered but (and this is me thinking out loud) what if the cure was never published, never mentioned, so that these companies would still keep getting money to fund their research.

The novel was well-paced, and while I was able to see some of the twists coming before they did, there were others that I didn’t see, which increased my enjoyment of it. Overall, I’d give it 3.5 stars, but I will definately be seeking out this author again in the future.

If you are interested in obtaining a copy of Dead End Deal, the following link will take you to the publishers website: http://astorandblue.com/dead-end-deal/

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on June 4, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

Review – The Night Ferry – Michael Robotham

29 May

One of my pet peeves when it comes to books is authors who double-dip characters in books that aren’t part of series, because I feel like I am always missing something. That was precisely the case of what happened with The Night Ferry. I knew that the author had written a series, but for my purposes, I wasn’t looking to starting a new series, so I opted to read what I assumed to be a stand-alone. Unfortunately, I soon found out that while The Night Ferry was technically a stand-alone, the author did refer back to events that had occurred in previous books. So I ended up spending a good portion of my time, puzzling that out (my library didn’t have any of the other books in audio format and I was looking specifically for an audiobook at the time). When viewing other reviews of this book after finishing it, it does appear as though I wasn’t the only person who felt that way, which was nice to see.

Overall, I liked the story that was presented, although at the same time it did seem to be very obvious from the beginning as to where the whole storyline was going. I wasn’t surprised by any of the twists in the story as they occurred. Based on my experiences with this book, I am not sure whether I will rush out to try this author again, but at the same time, I do have my standard, at least two books by an author prior to giving up on them. so maybe I’ll check out one of the books in the series and see how that plays out.

This is the first time that I have listened to a narration by Clare Corbett but I ended up enjoying it. I felt that she had a good range of voices that she used through-out and I didn’t feel like any of the voices had been over-done or repeated through-out the various characters. I will likely pick up other books narrated by her in the future to see if she can maintain this ability in other books.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on May 29, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , ,

Review: Vanish

14 Apr

Vanish
Vanish by Tess Gerritsen
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Review of the Book
Every once in a while a book comes along that touches on a significant topic and as a reader you are just blown away by not only the events that transpire, but that the fact that events like this happen in world. For me, Vanish, is just one of those books. In the past eight years since I have been in the military, every year I had had to complete a mandatory training called Trafficking in Persons – but like with most of the required trainings, I didn’t really take it seriously, clicked through the slides, in order to get the check in the box for having completed it. Now, looking back on that and after reading Vanish, I’m amazed by my ignorance of such a topic.

The book begins with the line, My name is Mila and this is my story and told in Gerritsen’s normal alternating perspective between Boston Homicide Detective Jane Rizzoli and Medical Examiner Maura Isle, as well as the perspective of Mila. There were times I was on the edge of my seat waiting to hear what happened and I didn’t want to stop listening to the book (unfortunately, since I was doing it on my commute to and from work I had to). The only thing holding me back from giving this a 5-star rating is the fact that I don’t know if I could see myself re-reading it in the future and those are the books I tend to give 5-stars to. Not because it wasn’t well-written, but because it was so disturbing.

Review of the Narration
So far I have listened to four books in this series, and gone through 3 different narrators. In this one, Susan Denaker, took over the reins from Kathe Mazur, who narrated book 4 and did a good job of it. All the voices had good inflection and I think she did a good job with Rizzoli’s Boston Irish accent. I think she did a slightly better job that Mazur with the male voices, and I was able to distinguish each character, but they didn’t quite live up the narration of the first 2 books by Anna Fields. I will however look for more narrations by her in the future.

View all my reviews

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on April 14, 2012 in Book Review

 

Tags: , , , , ,

← Older posts
Newer posts →