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ncrabb's review
4.0
The maid found Lilah Brecht beaten nearly unconscious early one morning. Peter Decker, recently converted to Judaism and relatively new husband to Rina Lazarus, drew the case. They rush Lilah to the hospital for examinations, and she later confesses she didn’t see her two attackers. Instead, she “imaged” them. She insists she saw them with her mind’s eye, and she’s quite prepared to craft a sketch with the help of a police artist.
That’s just the beginning of the bizarre nature of this book. Lilah owns a health spa, and she’s not the only character you’ll want to keep an eye on. Her eccentric has-been actress mother is also a person to whom you’ll want to pay attention. Cops get confused when they find no semen in any of her orifices. The case gets more confusing when Decker with the help from a lab links a developmentally disabled stable hand to the case—a stable hand who is so mentally deficient as to cast doubt on his ability to commit a rape.
The characters are all interesting here to varying degrees, but it’s the snapshots into Decker’s life as a recent convert to Judaism that fascinated me. You learn so much about the customs and traditions, especially since Decker and Lazarus are orthodox Jews. Add to that a sometimes-tense subplot that involves Rina’s burgeoning pregnancy and the unease Rina’s sons experience when they’re trying to figure out where and how they fit into the new family structure, and you have a mystery that will make you want to press on to the next book in the series.
That’s just the beginning of the bizarre nature of this book. Lilah owns a health spa, and she’s not the only character you’ll want to keep an eye on. Her eccentric has-been actress mother is also a person to whom you’ll want to pay attention. Cops get confused when they find no semen in any of her orifices. The case gets more confusing when Decker with the help from a lab links a developmentally disabled stable hand to the case—a stable hand who is so mentally deficient as to cast doubt on his ability to commit a rape.
The characters are all interesting here to varying degrees, but it’s the snapshots into Decker’s life as a recent convert to Judaism that fascinated me. You learn so much about the customs and traditions, especially since Decker and Lazarus are orthodox Jews. Add to that a sometimes-tense subplot that involves Rina’s burgeoning pregnancy and the unease Rina’s sons experience when they’re trying to figure out where and how they fit into the new family structure, and you have a mystery that will make you want to press on to the next book in the series.
pepper1133's review
4.0
Another fun, trashy Faye Kellerman mystery. Appreciated the fact that not everything ties up nicely with this one. We really do need to get away from the twist being that one character used to be a woman and is now a man. I'm totally down with transgender rights. Just not cool with seeing it as a superficial plot device all the time.
vaderbird's review
3.0
5 star - Perfect
4 star - i would recommend
3 star - good
2 star - struggled to complete
1 star - could not finish
4 star - i would recommend
3 star - good
2 star - struggled to complete
1 star - could not finish
fallchicken's review
4.0
Not my favorite of this series. There are some highly improbable characters and the solution to the mystery revolves around a highly unlikely set of coincidences.
skateanddonate's review against another edition
3.0
A so-so red. In the end the story felt really superficial. Meaning the crime touched on some pertinent issues in the main character's life, but it never really dug in and explored the meat of the story. I wanted the gritty details and emotional reactions, but all I got was a superficial telling of the crime.
liloud0626's review against another edition
3.0
Not as interesting to me as some of the others, mainly because it was lighter on the Judaism and heavier on the detective stuff, which sort of ran out of gas a little too early.
skinnypenguin's review against another edition
3.0
Quite an involved story with lots of suspects and false leads. Shows how some people cross boundaries when the character ,Lilah, comes to the detectives house and invades his private life. Her and her mother both tried to intimidate others with their wealth and fame. Quite a twist in the end with one of the suspects turning out not to be quite what they expected. Interesting how they pretty much figured out who masterminded everything but didn't have the proof to do anything about it and the lead detective in the end was ok letting others handle it.