Skeleton Man CD

Rating:
Summary: Barebones plot, no meat on this "Skeleton"
Review: *Sigh*.

When the thought of going through the newest Hillerman novel strikes you with dread rather than anticipation, you know there's a problem. But Hillerman has been off his game for so long now that I thought he couldn't produce a piece that was actually worse than his last, "The Sinister Pig."

Unfortunately, I was wrong.

The lethargy and creative desolation meandering through this novel like a late-summer creek make for a singularly unrewarding reading experience, particularly for those of us who grew up on the great Chee and Leaphorn books of the late 70's and early 80's.

Clearly, Hillerman seems to be bored with the mystery genre--why else would have had started with a post-plot flashback device that removes any possible tension?

Not that it matters anyway. Joe Leaphorn has become an afterthought in recent novels; here, he adds absolutely nothing other than connect-the-dots commentary that is completely irrelevant to the eventual outcome. More prose is devoted to the scheming white people who are the locus of a tired treasure-hunt/revenge plot than to our ever-patient band of Native-American law enforcers. Jim Chee was never the most gregarious character, but he was nearly always interesting--until now. Bernie Manuelito, now Chee's fiance, shows the resourceful side of Navajo women, but who really cares at this point? Even Hillerman's trademarked descriptions of the rugged southwest have become awkward; you can see the endless struggles with structure in nearly every sentence.

Perhaps it really is time for Hillerman to hang up the saddle, because this horse is running on empty.





Rating:
Summary: A Sad Disappointment
Review: As a big Tony Hillerman fan, I was sadly disappointed in Skeleton Man. It's barely a mystery; Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee do little detecting and the "mystery" is solved unrealistically with little more than a few questions, a walk down a trail and dumb luck. Worse, there is little character development. Leaphorn and Chee are not in the book much, and Chee seems quite unlike himself. (His fiance questions whether she wants to marry her "hard-voiced sergeant." Hard-voiced? Chee?) And worst of all, several stories in the book are repeated over and over and over. What's happened to this wonderful series?

Rating:
Summary: A fun read
Review: I am sad to see Mr. Hillerman getting low scores with the readers. I found this work to be an enjoyable read as the adventure brought us in contact with the mysterious Havasupai people in the inner gorge.

Like many readers, I wish that Mr. Hillerman had spent more time honing this novel. I wish the book gave us more information on the trails into the canyon and spent more time with the Havasupai.

I am giving the work 5 stars as the work does a pretty good job entwining the plot with the legends of Masaw (Skeleton Man).

Of course, my expectations weren't high on this 14 iteration of the Chee/Leaphorn formula. A quick read, where Mr. Hillerman's prose fell short, I simply let my imagination fill in the gaps.

Rating:
Summary: It Hurts to Say This, But...
Review: I found this book to be a major disappointment.

I've been reading Tony Hillerman since the Chee/Leaphorn series first started with the three Joe Leaphorn novels back in the 70s, and I truly relished reading each book until the last few. They have increasingly suffered from lack of good editing, and "Skeleton Man" is rife with mistakes, which made reading it a chore. I found myself going back and forth checking things all the time. For example, Jim Chee tells Cowboy Dashee and Bernie when they are down in the Grand Canyon looking for Dashee's missing cousin, Billy Tuve, that he will go down canyon to look for Tuve and Dashee needs to go up canyon, but a few pages later you read that Chee went up canyon. In mysteries, such mistakes are maddening because details are often so important to the plot.

In addition, I agree with other reviewers that both Chee and Leaphorn seem to be sleep walking through the book. They used to be such intersting characters whom you really cared about.

In conclusion, if this book were the first in the series and not the last, I would probably never buy another one. It's gotten that bad, which I find truly saddening.

Rating:
Summary: Darn, darn, darn
Review: I loved the first two thirds of this book. I was intrigued and relieved (after the Sinister Pig debacle) that perhaps Mr. Hillerman was back in form. But, whoops, nope. Once all the various characters had nicely arrived in the Canyon, he used a clumsy and obvious device to point Bernie in the right direction. Was this bad editing, too much pressure from the publisher, or did our beloved Mr. H just run outta steam? Whichever, I was disappointed. The final third was mechanical, formulaic and too darn short. PLUS, as an earlier review noted, only one sentence about the wedding. Yikes. Please, please, give us more. And better.



Rating:
Summary: I wish it was better.....
Review: I've been a huge Tony Hillerman fan for years; but his last three books haven't been up to par. "Skeleton Man" should be very good but isn't. The action gets progressively harder to follow as the story goes along. Characters seem to be mixed up in time and place once they start arriving at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. Part of the confusion could have been avoided if the book had been edited better. Being a fan, I would have bought the book even if I had known it was a difficult read. I hurts to say it, but perhaps it is time for Mr. Hillerman to enjoy a well earned retirement

Rating:
Summary: Skeleton Plot
Review: I've long been a big fan of Tony Hillerman but I have to say I'm disappointed in his latest novel. The plot is thin and Hillerman constantly interrupts his narrative and obscures the storyline with asides about Navajo and Hopi culture. He's always been commendably sensitive about native American traditions, but he's lost much of the suspense his earlier novels featured with his extraneous references.

Rating:
Summary: A disappointment
Review: Like many of the reviews here, I have to agree that the latest entry by Tony Hillerman is a disappointment. His series has been so strong and my fervent wish is that his next entry returns to his strengths.

This book suffers mostly from the lack of his two strong characters. Both Leaphorn and Chee are somewhat in the story line but their participation is lackluster and particularly for Leaphorn, very peripheral. The plot is hard to believe and the story is carried along by the actors in that same unrealistic plot. He brings some of his old magic to the description of the landscape of the Southwest but ultimately, the book is a disappointment.

I'll wait and hope for the next Hillerman and the return of his magic touch!


Rating:
Summary: An intriguing tale of greed, search and rescue
Review: The grand old man of American mystery writing, Tony Hillerman, brings our old friend Joe Leaphorn out of retirement to help his one-time protégé, Jim Chee, solve a half-century old mystery.

When Billy Tuve, a local Hopi who is acknowledged to be somewhat brain damaged and irresponsible, tries to pawn a magnificent, near perfect diamond, the finger of suspicion is pointed directly at him in connection with a recent robbery. Jim Chee is on the case with some reservations as to Billy's guilt, but the source of the diamond is unclear to all, even Billy Tuve. He swears he got it from an old man in a cave deep in the Grand Canyon, an explanation that does not wash with local authorities.

The arrival of a woman from New York, in search of clues surrounding the loss of her father fifty years earlier in the infamous collision of two jetliners over the Grand Canyon, piques the curiosity of the savvy Leaphorn who sees a connection between the two events. Long forgotten rumors that there was an attaché case containing diamonds on one of the planes resurface, and Leaphorn believes that diamond to be part of the collection.

Jim Chee has at last found the girl he wants to marry after several missed opportunities in prior books. Bernadette Manuelito is a reservation police officer who works the case with him, and tracks the good guys and bad guys down the forbidden Hopi trail.

This intriguing tale of greed, search and rescue, and deeper exploration into Hopi tribal rituals is a welcome return of Chee and Leaphorn, two of American mystery series' favorite and more exotic detectives.

Despite his frail health and advancing years, Hillerman has not lost his touch as he weaves the Indian lore, Hopi Salt Woman rituals, exotic flora and fauna of the Grand Canyon, and recent history into an intricate tale of cat and mouse during a desert monsoon storm deep within the canyon walls. He calls upon a team of researchers in Grand Canyon geology, ethnologists and historians to present a faithfully executed story that has earned him the decades-old respect of Indian scholars and mystery aficionados he so richly deserves.

--- Reviewed by Roz Shea


Rating:
Summary: Rough draft?
Review: Tony Hillerman is admirable for many things; unfortunately this book is not one of them.

Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee return to help Jim's old friend, Cowboy Dashee, clear his mentally handicapped cousin of a robbery and murder charge. Chee and Bernie Manuelito are going to be married. Leaphorn is invited by Captain Pinto to look into a robbery-murder case because of certain similarities in the accussed's story to one that surfaced years before in the Short Mountain Trading Post burgulary case that Leaphorn had investigated. Leaphorn hears that Shorty McGinnis is dead but goes to check it out. However, little detecting goes into this story. It is more of a paint-by-numbers adventure story. The pieces are all there and in the right place but the prose is repetitious; Hillerman has to have every character tell the same story over and over. Still, Hillerman remains a master of weaving native Southwestern myth into modern situations and communicates very well how myth is made.

The story has the feel of a second-hand story that you are repeating to a friend without first organizing it. Maybe that was the intention given how the book begins and ends, but, if so, this experiment failed. I get the feeling that the deadline for the book came before he had time to rewrite and the editor didn't bother. If you are new to this series, don't start here. Read the first books in this series. This has been a very entertaining series and may continue to be. I hope so.