22 reviews for:

Sanctuary

Faye Kellerman

3.81 AVERAGE

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
dark mysterious fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Great read. Loved the excursion to Israel. Loved the conversation about gets, but not necessarily the story line of it. I mean the conversation they had about it while in Israel was fantastic. However, watching the story line play out was unsettling. Both murders fell in that gray area where I'm not really sure how I feel. There just isn't an easy answer to either of the situations. Was it right or was it condoning? And was there enough closure? My second favorite in series so far.

Cutting a Window to See How the Grain Runs

“…when Honey asked if she and the kids might spend a week with Rina and her family in Los Angeles, Rina thought it strange.“ p 3 Rina Decker’s former classmate Honey Klein married to an ultra-religious Leibbener Chasidic and they rather maintained a very sporadic contact. Now out of the blue, she wants to drop by for a week with only two days‘ notice. The two women’s lifestyles are different: In Honey’s world, there are no TVs or private phones in the houses, no popular fiction or magazines. No phones is a first even to Rina. And Rina, since she married LAPD cop Pete, kind of shifted from orthodox more to modern orthodox Judaism.

At the same time, Pete follows his partner Marge Dunn on a lead to the house of a family that disappeared; husband, wife, two sons in the middle of the school year. Nothing seems to have been searched, nothing taken but the boys passports. Might they have done harm to their parents? Or has the whole family fled? But – why? The husband is a wealthy diamond dealer as is Honey’s husband. Is it a mere coincidence when Honey cannot reach her husband? All the while, Pete and Marge, lately transferred from Juvey to Homicide, have to deal with the snide remarks from their new „Loo“ (Lieutenant) – on women and “niceties“ such as “Looks like the Jews know to hold a buck.“ p 133. But fortunately, Pete and Rina know what a mezuzah is for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mezuzah

Author Faye Kellerman tried for something completely new with this one – the routine police procedural was added up with elements in between economic crime, adventure and international/political conspiracy. She has me in with that mix. It turns out with Pete and Rina travelling to Israel, as all traits seem to be leading there, to the namegiving “Sanctuary“ for all Jews, has in it lots of background related to the diamond business and considerations on Jewish marriage and divorce (a nice idea to have a Rabbi go and beat your to-be-ex-husband if he is unwilling to agree with a divorce…) as well as on some of the very different ways of religious approaches in Judaism. Unfortunately, the next four books of the series are missing in my collection. Well, they do as of TODAY

4,5 out of 5 stars (half a star off as some of the adventure/political parts are a slight bit too exaggerated – though I admit I would love to see those in a movie)

Probably three and a half stars, to be honest. I'm happy Rina got to be more instrumental this time around, although a lot of it was simply her translating Hebrew for Peter in Israel. The subplot regarding Honey Klein was more of a red herring than anything else, which was a disappointment. The killer was introduced far too late into the story (though I'm satisfied with how that person was dealt with in the end)..

5 star - Perfect
4 star - i would recommend
3 star - good
2 star - struggled to complete
1 star - could not finish
adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Plot
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

Diamonds and international terrorism. Informative (a bonus) and a good read, although I was ready for it to be over at the end.

I usually like all her books, but this one didn't sustain my attention.

1996 review

I really liked this one, in which Decker and Rina go to Israel to search for some missing friends and a killer, and there's a connection with diamond dealers, Middle East politics and so on. It was an amazing book. I also like that Peter [Decker] has a need both for Rina, his wife, and Marge, his partner, completely separate and completely different.