Regina

Really bad

Revisado: 01-26-24

Gerritsen is a smooth writer but this time out, she's an empty one. Every single thing is improbable and not fun. She has written a caper with lead feet. I couldn't drag myself to the ending.

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Unanswered: Who did it?

Revisado: 11-29-23

This very good writer likes to muse about the means and methods of detective fiction history. Covering this is a threadbare plot. The writer makes the plot matter as he undermines it. Good characters wander in, make an impact and disappear. One is left hanging in a terrible situation. In the end, the writer won't say who the murderer is. I wouldn't have listened to it had I known. There's such a thing as too clever.

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Horrible

Revisado: 10-28-23

This is a creepy book. Characters are cliches with cliche plots to drag themselves through. Way too much drama that has nothing to do with the drama. The world is awful, and so is almost everybody in it. Over the top. Hated it. On the other hand, Simon Vance is wonderful. If I didn't understand English, I'd be happy to listen to this as I fell asleep.

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Soap opera science

Revisado: 06-20-23

I dislike it too much to read it further than the few hours I've already spent. It's a drawn out, entirely predictable tale of a young woman scientist who (shock) in the 1950s encounters lots of prejudice at work and in her social life. On and on about it. Way too much laying this out, with entirely obvious examples. For whom would this be a surprise? If you guessed that she is brave and determined, and also beautiful, you know this story already. She's plucky. The summary provided promised wrinkles to come, but they took too long to arrive. Narrator good.

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Eccentric is not enough

Revisado: 01-06-22

Yes, main character is probably on the spectrum. Increasingly, such narrators are finding a successful footing in contemporary fiction, but this book is too slow and way too obvious. Molly the maid is going to be accused of everything. Will she turn the tables and evade the fate the real murderer intended for her? Who knows and who cares. I didn't finish this. Regret buying it. Narrator ok, nothing special.

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Throwing away a good character

Revisado: 12-12-21

Good start for a main character, good plot, and that's the first 10 minutes. After that, the story devolves into 1950s sexual stereotypes that are so tired I kept skipping ahead to find good parts. There weren't any.

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Sad Sack Hero

Revisado: 11-28-21

Michael Koryta wrote one of the best thrillers I've ever listened to - "Those Who Wish Me Dead." That book kept me listening to other books of his. This one is the worst. It's the ultimate in dreary heroes. Everybody's corrupt except for our hero and a very wronged dead guy. Everybody is flawed. Everybody has deep ruts running down their roads that make forward momentum unlikely. It's long and for me tedious.

One other thing: A journalist in this story whom all say is tops writes a piece that is planted by the bad guys. Not her fault, says everybody. But the journalist has one source, one with no apparent reason to be trusted. I've been a reporter at a daily. One source news stories are for crackpots. Koryta must know that. Even if a reporter is an idiot, there are editors. If you don't follow the multiple-sources rule, you're not a reporter. Narrator keeps the plot from stalling out.

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Excellent

Revisado: 06-23-21

Starts predictably with a typically strained relationship between mom and daughter over cultural differences. Then the story breaks from this well-worn territory and digs into something unexpected and challenging. If a reviewer spoils the surprise, shame on them. I read this cold. Cold is best. All narrators excellent.

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Couldn't take the hatred of women

Revisado: 06-13-19

Great narrator. Perfect for this story. The story has its charms. Village life on an island early in 20th Century England. I wasn't expecting anyone to be a feminist, exactly, even though they were around back then. Grumbling about women seems appropriate for this elderly solitary male. But it's the number of negative women in his life that ultimately did me in. His world has good guys, angel of feminine mercy and horrible females. The last outnumber everybody else. They ruin lives, again and again and again. The writer's dislike of half the population shone through this fictional world and ruined his otherwise charming story.

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True believers only

Revisado: 04-27-19

This isn't a book of spiritual comfort for the anxious. Its premise is that every word in the Bible is true, that God directs all things and has your personal good in His vast mind. If you see inconsistencies in the Bible, understand much of it to be metaphor instead of fact, this book is not for you. If you doubt that Adam and Eve are in fact the first humans, if you doubt the snake and the apple tree story, don't get this. On the other hand, Max Lucado is a gentle guy. His belief is, for me, rigid and even ridiculous, but his presentation is lovely. There is just too much to overlook. Science, for instance. Human history. The universe.

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