Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.08 AVERAGE
3.08 AVERAGE
Warning, there will be spoilers.
Amanda Martin is a brilliant high school senior, whose beautiful mother, Indiana Jackson, is only 33 years old. Her father is the deputy chief of Police of San Francisco in charge of Homicide and her grandfather is a loving presence in her life. Her parents have been divorced since she was 3.
Amanda is fascinated by crime, has a logical, scientific mind and doesn't understand her mother's new age beliefs as an energy healer. Amanda's Godmother is Celeste, a famous Astrologer. Celeste predicts a bloodbath in San Francisco, so Amanda and her grandfather, Blake, decide to prove her wrong.
Amanda is the game master for an on-line game called Ripper, leading a group of teenagers in investigating the crimes of Jack the Ripper. Now, she redirects the game to crime in modern day San Francisco. After a brutal killing happens in a local high school and horrific footage makes its way online, that crime starts the focus for the Ripper players that leads them to discover a serial killer.
This is a complex novel with a lot of characters. The basic story premise is actually fascinating. The Ripper game sounds like something I would really enjoy. The killer is an interesting character. You have sympathy for him, ultimately, even as you are horrified for his crimes.
With this many characters, the book gets like a soap opera. Sometimes that works, sometimes not. There are several places where it felt like the story was going in a specific direction and then it just fizzled out. Characters would just disappear. Also, as each character is introduced, the author spends several paragraphs giving a history of the character. That history would get expanded on as the character was re-visited the next time around. While there were some of these background stories that were helpful to the overall plot, many of them felt like filler.
This is where the spoilers come in, because there is a glaring omission in this plot device. It truly stands out and makes you wonder why you aren't getting this person's history and you realize, that the history would give away how this killer became a killer. You do ultimately get that story, but by then you know who it is.
This is a case where I feel like the audio book affected my enjoyment. I might have liked this better if I had read it instead of listened to it. The reader was not bad, but I did not enjoy his characterizations - particularly Amanda. While Allende actually describes Amanda as spoiled more than once, she comes across as a spoiled little bitch with no skills to function in the world. Truthfully, I didn't like a lot of the characters, chief among them Amanda, Indiana and Indy's two lovers, Alan Keller and Ryan Miller.
Also note that this book is a translation and it needed a seconded editing of the translation. There are several places where this shows up, but the most annoying is the interchangeable use of "van" and "pick-up" since the vehicle in question figures into the story. It's a little confusing.
Overall, I still enjoyed it.
Amanda Martin is a brilliant high school senior, whose beautiful mother, Indiana Jackson, is only 33 years old. Her father is the deputy chief of Police of San Francisco in charge of Homicide and her grandfather is a loving presence in her life. Her parents have been divorced since she was 3.
Amanda is fascinated by crime, has a logical, scientific mind and doesn't understand her mother's new age beliefs as an energy healer. Amanda's Godmother is Celeste, a famous Astrologer. Celeste predicts a bloodbath in San Francisco, so Amanda and her grandfather, Blake, decide to prove her wrong.
Amanda is the game master for an on-line game called Ripper, leading a group of teenagers in investigating the crimes of Jack the Ripper. Now, she redirects the game to crime in modern day San Francisco. After a brutal killing happens in a local high school and horrific footage makes its way online, that crime starts the focus for the Ripper players that leads them to discover a serial killer.
This is a complex novel with a lot of characters. The basic story premise is actually fascinating. The Ripper game sounds like something I would really enjoy. The killer is an interesting character. You have sympathy for him, ultimately, even as you are horrified for his crimes.
With this many characters, the book gets like a soap opera. Sometimes that works, sometimes not. There are several places where it felt like the story was going in a specific direction and then it just fizzled out. Characters would just disappear. Also, as each character is introduced, the author spends several paragraphs giving a history of the character. That history would get expanded on as the character was re-visited the next time around. While there were some of these background stories that were helpful to the overall plot, many of them felt like filler.
This is where the spoilers come in, because there is a glaring omission in this plot device. It truly stands out and makes you wonder why you aren't getting this person's history and you realize, that the history would give away how this killer became a killer. You do ultimately get that story, but by then you know who it is.
This is a case where I feel like the audio book affected my enjoyment. I might have liked this better if I had read it instead of listened to it. The reader was not bad, but I did not enjoy his characterizations - particularly Amanda. While Allende actually describes Amanda as spoiled more than once, she comes across as a spoiled little bitch with no skills to function in the world. Truthfully, I didn't like a lot of the characters, chief among them Amanda, Indiana and Indy's two lovers, Alan Keller and Ryan Miller.
Also note that this book is a translation and it needed a seconded editing of the translation. There are several places where this shows up, but the most annoying is the interchangeable use of "van" and "pick-up" since the vehicle in question figures into the story. It's a little confusing.
Overall, I still enjoyed it.
Warning, there will be spoilers.
Amanda Martin is a brilliant high school senior, whose beautiful mother, Indiana Jackson, is only 33 years old. Her father is the deputy chief of Police of San Francisco in charge of Homicide and her grandfather is a loving presence in her life. Her parents have been divorced since she was 3.
Amanda is fascinated by crime, has a logical, scientific mind and doesn't understand her mother's new age beliefs as an energy healer. Amanda's Godmother is Celeste, a famous Astrologer. Celeste predicts a bloodbath in San Francisco, so Amanda and her grandfather, Blake, decide to prove her wrong.
Amanda is the game master for an on-line game called Ripper, leading a group of teenagers in investigating the crimes of Jack the Ripper. Now, she redirects the game to crime in modern day San Francisco. After a brutal killing happens in a local high school and horrific footage makes its way online, that crime starts the focus for the Ripper players that leads them to discover a serial killer.
This is a complex novel with a lot of characters. The basic story premise is actually fascinating. The Ripper game sounds like something I would really enjoy. The killer is an interesting character. You have sympathy for him, ultimately, even as you are horrified for his crimes.
With this many characters, the book gets like a soap opera. Sometimes that works, sometimes not. There are several places where it felt like the story was going in a specific direction and then it just fizzled out. Characters would just disappear. Also, as each character is introduced, the author spends several paragraphs giving a history of the character. That history would get expanded on as the character was re-visited the next time around. While there were some of these background stories that were helpful to the overall plot, many of them felt like filler.
This is where the spoilers come in, because there is a glaring omission in this plot device. It truly stands out and makes you wonder why you aren't getting this person's history and you realize, that the history would give away how this killer became a killer. You do ultimately get that story, but by then you know who it is.
This is a case where I feel like the audio book affected my enjoyment. I might have liked this better if I had read it instead of listened to it. The reader was not bad, but I did not enjoy his characterizations - particularly Amanda. While Allende actually describes Amanda as spoiled more than once, she comes across as a spoiled little bitch with no skills to function in the world. Truthfully, I didn't like a lot of the characters, chief among them Amanda, Indiana and Indy's two lovers, Alan Keller and Ryan Miller.
Also note that this book is a translation and it needed a seconded editing of the translation. There are several places where this shows up, but the most annoying is the interchangeable use of "van" and "pick-up" since the vehicle in question figures into the story. It's a little confusing.
Overall, I still enjoyed it.
Amanda Martin is a brilliant high school senior, whose beautiful mother, Indiana Jackson, is only 33 years old. Her father is the deputy chief of Police of San Francisco in charge of Homicide and her grandfather is a loving presence in her life. Her parents have been divorced since she was 3.
Amanda is fascinated by crime, has a logical, scientific mind and doesn't understand her mother's new age beliefs as an energy healer. Amanda's Godmother is Celeste, a famous Astrologer. Celeste predicts a bloodbath in San Francisco, so Amanda and her grandfather, Blake, decide to prove her wrong.
Amanda is the game master for an on-line game called Ripper, leading a group of teenagers in investigating the crimes of Jack the Ripper. Now, she redirects the game to crime in modern day San Francisco. After a brutal killing happens in a local high school and horrific footage makes its way online, that crime starts the focus for the Ripper players that leads them to discover a serial killer.
This is a complex novel with a lot of characters. The basic story premise is actually fascinating. The Ripper game sounds like something I would really enjoy. The killer is an interesting character. You have sympathy for him, ultimately, even as you are horrified for his crimes.
With this many characters, the book gets like a soap opera. Sometimes that works, sometimes not. There are several places where it felt like the story was going in a specific direction and then it just fizzled out. Characters would just disappear. Also, as each character is introduced, the author spends several paragraphs giving a history of the character. That history would get expanded on as the character was re-visited the next time around. While there were some of these background stories that were helpful to the overall plot, many of them felt like filler.
This is where the spoilers come in, because there is a glaring omission in this plot device. It truly stands out and makes you wonder why you aren't getting this person's history and you realize, that the history would give away how this killer became a killer. You do ultimately get that story, but by then you know who it is.
This is a case where I feel like the audio book affected my enjoyment. I might have liked this better if I had read it instead of listened to it. The reader was not bad, but I did not enjoy his characterizations - particularly Amanda. While Allende actually describes Amanda as spoiled more than once, she comes across as a spoiled little bitch with no skills to function in the world. Truthfully, I didn't like a lot of the characters, chief among them Amanda, Indiana and Indy's two lovers, Alan Keller and Ryan Miller.
Also note that this book is a translation and it needed a seconded editing of the translation. There are several places where this shows up, but the most annoying is the interchangeable use of "van" and "pick-up" since the vehicle in question figures into the story. It's a little confusing.
Overall, I still enjoyed it.
the end of the book was beautiful, I really enjoyed it.. now, the other like.. 400 pages were almost unnecessary.. Personally, I wouldn't really recommend it
This isn't really 2 stars--maybe 2 1/2 or even 3--but this book and Isabel Allende have me annoyed so I'm giving it only 2. First of all, this is billed as a thriller and it's not a thriller or even much of a mystery until near the end, and then just a mediocre one. The twist is kind of interesting, but she gives it away by having the bad guy monologue at the end in a really obvious, annoying way. After reading this and Maya's Notebook, I just have to wonder: why did I ever think I liked Isabel Allende? What did she write that was so good? Because these latest two are really mediocre.
This is mostly a sporadically interesting character study about a bunch of kooky North Beach residents, but the plot meanders along for a long time, and I didn't really care about any of these people. And the precocious daughter who's supposed to be solving the mystery is really annoying and not likable at all. I don't want to write anymore except to say that I'm not reading Allende anymore.
This is mostly a sporadically interesting character study about a bunch of kooky North Beach residents, but the plot meanders along for a long time, and I didn't really care about any of these people. And the precocious daughter who's supposed to be solving the mystery is really annoying and not likable at all. I don't want to write anymore except to say that I'm not reading Allende anymore.
This one just took a little too long to come together for me. A lot of characters and things going on and it didn't really "get good" until way too late in the story. Once it did, it was good...just not too sure it deserves more than 3 stars.
Niet geheel overtuigd, begin viel me traag en ik geraakte niet in het verhaal.
De laatste 100 pagina's wel in één ruk uitgelezen.
De laatste 100 pagina's wel in één ruk uitgelezen.
This book took me quite some time to read, in part because I couldn't sink into it the way I normally do with mystery novels. The crimes were grisly, as I've come to expect from books like this but I couldn't help but feel that something here was lost in translation. Some scenes just seemed extraneous and like they were there to fill the pages over containing any pertinent information.
I found the plot a little bit predictable, although a child as a main character in a novel such as this was an interesting idea and I found myself enjoying Amanda and some of the other characters. I figured out the two possibilities of who the killer could be, and lo and behold they were both one person so I felt a little bit accomplished.
I feel like there was no reason to kill Ryan however, and do wonder why the author decided to make that decision. For me the most interesting parts of the novel were the last 100 pages, beyond that it is something I won't pick up again but I just don't think the style and pacing was my cup of tea.
I found the plot a little bit predictable, although a child as a main character in a novel such as this was an interesting idea and I found myself enjoying Amanda and some of the other characters. I figured out the two possibilities of who the killer could be, and lo and behold they were both one person so I felt a little bit accomplished.
I feel like there was no reason to kill Ryan however, and do wonder why the author decided to make that decision. For me the most interesting parts of the novel were the last 100 pages, beyond that it is something I won't pick up again but I just don't think the style and pacing was my cup of tea.
Allende should not write mysteries. What a waste of time.
I changed my mind about this book multiple times while reading it, at first I thought it was pretty dumb and in general that feeling stayed, I rolled my eyes at way too much stuff for me to say it was good, but I guess I got attached to the characters somewhat and ended up wanting to know more, even though I found most of them annoying. The only character I really liked was the grandpa, the concept of Ripper, the game, was cool but I didn't get to see enough of it and too much of the other characters' relationship drama which... nah.
adventurous
dark
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No