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claudiaswisher 's review for:
Ripper
by Isabel Allende
Have read Allende's magical-realism, her memoir. I don't know what I expected...some mystery, some suspense.
I listened to this one, and I think that colored my opinions of the characters. The reader's dialog for Amanda made her sound petulant and hard to be around. But other readers loved her.
My students knew I cried at books. They knew to roll their eyes indulgently and go back to their own books. My tears actually 'sold' more than one book...but listening? In the car? Ugly crying at the end? Sitting in a hot car with the battery draining so I could finish? A new experience.
Some readers got impatient with the characterization, but I loved it. I got to know each character in detail...got to know how they thought and why. Actually the characterization is important in the solution of the mystery...with lots of misdirection thrown in.
Allende has created San Francisco as a character in the book...and it makes me want to go back.
Amanda, daughter of divorced-but-still-connected Indiana and Bob. Amanda's grandparents are still very involved in her life, as are Indiana's clients. Mom is a new-age healer, Dad is a hardboiled police detective.
Amanda plays an online crime-solving game with other teens from around the world, but the abstractions become sickeningly real when a serial killer prowls San Fran. And we know from the beginning that Indiana has been abducted and will be killed unless Amanda and her buddies figure out what's going on.
Indiana collects men, and she has two completely different ones enamoured...Ryan, an ex-Navy SEAL, now an amputee, and Alan, a society leech who is not who he seems.
We know the killer has to be someone in the large circle that surrounds Indiana...we just don't know. And then when we think we do, we don't really.
The last hour of the book was stressful to listen to, and the last minutes were ugly-crying-inducing.
Not my favorite Allende, but I appreciate that she's growing, experimenting. Trying new genre. Trying something new is risky, but she puts herself out there.
I listened to this one, and I think that colored my opinions of the characters. The reader's dialog for Amanda made her sound petulant and hard to be around. But other readers loved her.
My students knew I cried at books. They knew to roll their eyes indulgently and go back to their own books. My tears actually 'sold' more than one book...but listening? In the car? Ugly crying at the end? Sitting in a hot car with the battery draining so I could finish? A new experience.
Some readers got impatient with the characterization, but I loved it. I got to know each character in detail...got to know how they thought and why. Actually the characterization is important in the solution of the mystery...with lots of misdirection thrown in.
Allende has created San Francisco as a character in the book...and it makes me want to go back.
Amanda, daughter of divorced-but-still-connected Indiana and Bob. Amanda's grandparents are still very involved in her life, as are Indiana's clients. Mom is a new-age healer, Dad is a hardboiled police detective.
Amanda plays an online crime-solving game with other teens from around the world, but the abstractions become sickeningly real when a serial killer prowls San Fran. And we know from the beginning that Indiana has been abducted and will be killed unless Amanda and her buddies figure out what's going on.
Indiana collects men, and she has two completely different ones enamoured...Ryan, an ex-Navy SEAL, now an amputee, and Alan, a society leech who is not who he seems.
We know the killer has to be someone in the large circle that surrounds Indiana...we just don't know. And then when we think we do, we don't really.
The last hour of the book was stressful to listen to, and the last minutes were ugly-crying-inducing.
Not my favorite Allende, but I appreciate that she's growing, experimenting. Trying new genre. Trying something new is risky, but she puts herself out there.