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3.53 AVERAGE
3.53 AVERAGE
I love David Rosenfelt. He's one of my favorite authors. He holds the distinction of being one of the only authors who can actually make me laugh out loud. That said, this book was disappointing. I wanted to quit reading it but I made myself finish.
I should find a print edition of this book for comparison, because the narrator of the audiobook said at one point "I saw him lying face down on his back." This was one of several sloppy things about this book. Another big one for me was a ridiculous scene with computer geeks who, in real life, would've known that their piece of the drawn-out "nail-biting" search could've been reduced from hours to minutes simply by using an Excel spreadsheet.
I really enjoy [a:David Rosenfelt|277189|David Rosenfelt|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/authors/1245933839p2/277189.jpg]'s Andy Carpenter series, and I've liked the other standalone books as well. This was no exception, though I did miss the humor that's so prevalent in the Andy Carpenter series. A famous former basketball player-turned lawyer-turned judge is murdered in his garage. An anonymous tip leads police officer Lucas Somers to a drug user that the judge was set to sentence in the near future. In the process of the apprehension, the druggie is killed. And then things begin to go a little crazy. I don't want to spoil anything here (what I've said so far all happens in the first few short chapters). Everything you could possibly want from a mystery - political intrigue, unexpected twists (though I did guess ahead of the big reveal who the big baddie was), and a life-or-death deadline. A real page turner.
This was a book club pick and first time I’d read anything by David Rosenfelt. Two thumbs up! Although is started a bit slow, once the kidnapping happened, the ticking time clock was established, and the tension increased ten-fold.
Basic premise (if to refresh my memory, if anything) Judge who is days away from being confirmed onto the Second Circuit Court of Appeals is murdered. The local detectives, along with the FBI are investigating. When an anonymous call comes into the local PD, it sets off a chain of events that will include more murder and a coverup. A drug addict, Steven Gallagher, is implicated in the murder, but his brother (Chris), knows Steven is many things but a killer is not one of them. To ensure Steven is proven innocent, Chris takes his own form of justice and the lives of the Somers brothers and the Gallagher brothers become intertwined. Oh yea, there’s political intrigue. It’s this political greed that lit the fuse that finally designates the bomb. Oh my….so good.
The short chapters, the multiple points of views, and the puzzle of where everyone and everything fit had me on the edge of my seat. There’s a death towards the end that really surprised me and then I had to keep reading as I hadn’t expected the story to take this particular twist.
Yep, it was good!
Basic premise (if to refresh my memory, if anything) Judge who is days away from being confirmed onto the Second Circuit Court of Appeals is murdered. The local detectives, along with the FBI are investigating. When an anonymous call comes into the local PD, it sets off a chain of events that will include more murder and a coverup. A drug addict, Steven Gallagher, is implicated in the murder, but his brother (Chris), knows Steven is many things but a killer is not one of them. To ensure Steven is proven innocent, Chris takes his own form of justice and the lives of the Somers brothers and the Gallagher brothers become intertwined. Oh yea, there’s political intrigue. It’s this political greed that lit the fuse that finally designates the bomb. Oh my….so good.
The short chapters, the multiple points of views, and the puzzle of where everyone and everything fit had me on the edge of my seat. There’s a death towards the end that really surprised me and then I had to keep reading as I hadn’t expected the story to take this particular twist.
Yep, it was good!
I felt the writing was sub-par 6th grade level. He basically explained EVERYTHING as he wrote. Even stuff that any casual reader of mysteries and thrillers would know by now. It was like reading the post-it notes that he prepared to write the novel. And for Somers not to try looking for missile silos at the get go was so obviously a setup for the miraculous discovery of one, it was laughable. The storyline was a good premise, and in the hands of someone like Child or Connelly or Coben, it could have been a good novel. But Rosenfelt just did not thrill me, and I would not be inclined to try another of his novels.
Ironically, this thriller was rather leaky. The plot had more holes than swiss cheese.
If you passed on this book for whatever reason, you missed a great opportunity to read breathlessly or very nearly so. An explanation is in order:
Luke Somers is a detective in a small New Jersey town in transition. It is a company town essentially; its residents have relied largely on one company to provide the community’s jobs. But that company is in trouble, and while the citizens don’t know that, they are brutally made aware that something is horribly awry the day an appeals court nominee is murdered in his garage while eating a Fudgsicle. Soon, a local addict is fingered for the killing, since the judge sentenced the addict to prison years earlier. When Detective Somers and his associates arrive, the young man raises a gun, forcing Luke to kill him in self defense. But Chris Gallagher, a marine stationed in Afghanistan, knows his brother would never have killed a cop. He returns to New Jersey on leave, and while he intends to confront Luke Somers, it is Luke’s brother, Bryan, whom he finds outside Luke’s house that fateful night. Feeling that justice would at least be partially served, Chris kidnaps Bryan Somers, takes him to a location underground, pipes in only enough air to last seven days, gives him a laptop with email capability but no other connectivity, and notifies Luke that his brother has a week to live if Luke can’t find a way to clear the addict of the death of the judge.
The case flounders initially, and precious time is wasted looking in the wrong places for the wrong reasons. Meanwhile, you almost hear the ticking of some unseen iron-fisted clock somewhere as options run out for Bryan Gallagher.
Luke Somers is a detective in a small New Jersey town in transition. It is a company town essentially; its residents have relied largely on one company to provide the community’s jobs. But that company is in trouble, and while the citizens don’t know that, they are brutally made aware that something is horribly awry the day an appeals court nominee is murdered in his garage while eating a Fudgsicle. Soon, a local addict is fingered for the killing, since the judge sentenced the addict to prison years earlier. When Detective Somers and his associates arrive, the young man raises a gun, forcing Luke to kill him in self defense. But Chris Gallagher, a marine stationed in Afghanistan, knows his brother would never have killed a cop. He returns to New Jersey on leave, and while he intends to confront Luke Somers, it is Luke’s brother, Bryan, whom he finds outside Luke’s house that fateful night. Feeling that justice would at least be partially served, Chris kidnaps Bryan Somers, takes him to a location underground, pipes in only enough air to last seven days, gives him a laptop with email capability but no other connectivity, and notifies Luke that his brother has a week to live if Luke can’t find a way to clear the addict of the death of the judge.
The case flounders initially, and precious time is wasted looking in the wrong places for the wrong reasons. Meanwhile, you almost hear the ticking of some unseen iron-fisted clock somewhere as options run out for Bryan Gallagher.
3 1/2 stars. Not nearly as good as the Andy Carpenter books, but a good story just the same.
Daniel Brennan is going to be a federal judge, succeeding Susan Dembeck, except he gets stabbed to death in his garage. Detective Lucas Somers shoots the suspected killer, Steven Gallagher, when he finds Steven sitting in his apartment holding a gun. Chris Gallagher, Steven's brother, comes back from Afghanistan to find out what happened and exact justice for what he sees as his brother's murder. Chris will do anything to avenge his brother and Luke finds out to what lengths Chris will go. Edward Holland didn't plan on ending up as mayor of a podunk town in New Jersey; he had much bigger plans than that. But first, he had to survive the federal lawsuit brought by Carlton Auto Parts. Nobody was going to walk away a winner from this.