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3.87 AVERAGE
3.87 AVERAGE
Sean King and his ex-Secret Service partner Michelle embark on another high-rolling adventure on this latest Baldacci book. The plot is complex, following the First Lady and her family, as well as Michelle's own family, and in the meantime some strange people in rural America.
Baldacci brings the three threads together in an explosive, well-thought finale. The chemistry just works and I'm looking forward to more books featuring these characters.
Baldacci brings the three threads together in an explosive, well-thought finale. The chemistry just works and I'm looking forward to more books featuring these characters.
Engaging characters, involved and unfortunately all too believable plot. This could have been 2 books, with all the plot and detail!
Overall I liked this book. Having been written almost 15 years ago let me say that Baldacci has gotten much better at writing female characters. There are a few cringe moments in this book where the female characters feel very flat and two dimensional. But I thought the story was good and enjoyed how it wrapped up plot points from previous book with Maxwell.
The First Family chronologs an elaborate plot involving the presidential family that not only puts the president’s position at risk, but jeopardises everything and everyone around them.
I have to say the story started out as a bit of a mess. There’s complex and ambiguous, then there’s convoluted and confusing. The initial problem was the old “who is the main character here?” which was party intentional because as readers we were expected to sympathise with all the characters not just the ‘good’ guys, but still, as mentioned, was convoluted and confusing. The first scenes introduce us to: The presidential family, a mysterious plotter and two gung-ho secret agents/private detectives/ FBI agents (I forget which).
The main problem was that different literary processes suggested each character was the one we should be empathising with: The presidential first lady was introduced early on, and had a crime committed against her family (also the title of the book was first family.) Our mystery plotter seemed bad, but was probably the character with most depth, I found myself relating to them the most, then we had the action-heros, who were cliché overly perfect superhero characters and for those reasons seemed like they might be our protagonists (the fact that I can’t even remember their names however does suggests they weren’t really) Anyways my point is, and sorry if this may be a spoiler, the author wants to play with our ideas about who is the good guy and who is the bad, unfortunately it comes across as clumsy, the story probably could have done without a few of the characters and just been about the key players. Oh well
Other than characters the storyline is quite interesting, and the real page turner is the desire to know just what is going on. Towards the end things start getting a bit over-the-top ridiculous, in a “Now Mr Bond we’re going to put you into an elaborate trap that you will eventually escape” kinda way.
The action is well written and exciting and the prose is easy on the eyes, at first this seemed like a mammoth-long book but it can be read in what seems like no time. Overall First Family is probably better than most thriller schlup out there but doesn’t win any medals (from me anyway)
I have to say the story started out as a bit of a mess. There’s complex and ambiguous, then there’s convoluted and confusing. The initial problem was the old “who is the main character here?” which was party intentional because as readers we were expected to sympathise with all the characters not just the ‘good’ guys, but still, as mentioned, was convoluted and confusing. The first scenes introduce us to: The presidential family, a mysterious plotter and two gung-ho secret agents/private detectives/ FBI agents (I forget which).
The main problem was that different literary processes suggested each character was the one we should be empathising with: The presidential first lady was introduced early on, and had a crime committed against her family (also the title of the book was first family.) Our mystery plotter seemed bad, but was probably the character with most depth, I found myself relating to them the most, then we had the action-heros, who were cliché overly perfect superhero characters and for those reasons seemed like they might be our protagonists (the fact that I can’t even remember their names however does suggests they weren’t really) Anyways my point is, and sorry if this may be a spoiler, the author wants to play with our ideas about who is the good guy and who is the bad, unfortunately it comes across as clumsy, the story probably could have done without a few of the characters and just been about the key players. Oh well
Other than characters the storyline is quite interesting, and the real page turner is the desire to know just what is going on. Towards the end things start getting a bit over-the-top ridiculous, in a “Now Mr Bond we’re going to put you into an elaborate trap that you will eventually escape” kinda way.
The action is well written and exciting and the prose is easy on the eyes, at first this seemed like a mammoth-long book but it can be read in what seems like no time. Overall First Family is probably better than most thriller schlup out there but doesn’t win any medals (from me anyway)
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Really creative plot with some pretty cringey moments. It was also way too long; could have been a much tighter plot if it was about 100 pages shorter.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Rape, Sexism, Kidnapping, Murder
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Enjoyed this novel. Interesting twists and non predictive story lines intertwined nicely.