Rating: Summary: A great day on Dog Island Review: A great story! I love mysteries where I am not only drawn in, but I'm transported. After finishing Dog Island I felt like I just got back from Florida. I was scratching at imaginary mosquito bites. Mike Stewart has an intimate, distinctive style that draws you in and makes you at home, even when Tom is about to get stomped by swamp hillbillies with big trucks. He never lets the story go and his characters are fresh and compelling.Thanks for a great time, Mike. I can't wait to meet Tom and friends again.
Rating: Summary: A great day on Dog Island Review: A great story! I love mysteries where I am not only drawn in, but I'm transported. After finishing Dog Island I felt like I just got back from Florida. I was scratching at imaginary mosquito bites. Mike Stewart has an intimate, distinctive style that draws you in and makes you at home, even when Tom is about to get stomped by swamp hillbillies with big trucks. He never lets the story go and his characters are fresh and compelling. Thanks for a great time, Mike. I can't wait to meet Tom and friends again.
Rating: Summary: Great Page Turner Review: After reading two pages of Dog Island, I knew this was a book I had to finish. Mike Stewart does a masterful job of grabbing your attention early and keeping you guessing in which direction the characters will go next. This is a mystery that you won't figure out until the end (but don't start there). Great job Mike, and thanks for the autograph (New Orleans 2/17/01). I will definitely follow up with Sins of the Brother.
Rating: Summary: Keep'em Coming!! Review: Dog Island was the first Mike Stewart mystery I had ever read and it was so good that within a day of finishing it I bought and was reading Sins of the Brother. Stewart's books are beautifully detailed, exciting, and well written. He is the best, I recommend his novels to anyone who loves to read!
Rating: Summary: Great action swamped by implausibilty Review: I'm going to keep picking up Stewart's books because the pacing and style are becoming more polished. An absolutely riveting page turner that is killed by being too complicated. Keep it simple. A good book doesn't need three endings. How do all those bodies go undiscovered? Our hero figures out the complex and overlooks the obvious. Strangers divulge secrets and offer aid without motive. There's a great book coming and I will wait.
Rating: Summary: Good, but not as good as first, less belivable Review: If this book didn't keep you on the edge of your seat wondering what could possibly happen next, I don't know what would. Up until the last few paragraphs, the book twisted and turned with all sorts of possible changes. True to form, Mr Stewart has written an excellent book, with characters that are good, but not quite as good as his first work, Sins of the Brother. There is one picky detail that I'm stuck on, since I live in Mobile. The last time I checked, I-65 runs north/south, and I-10 runs east/west....
Rating: Summary: No surprises my foot!! This was a good book!! Review: If this book didn't keep you on the edge of your seat wondering what could possibly happen next, I don't know what would. Up until the last few paragraphs, the book twisted and turned with all sorts of possible changes. True to form, Mr Stewart has written an excellent book, with characters that are good, but not quite as good as his first work, Sins of the Brother. There is one picky detail that I'm stuck on, since I live in Mobile. The last time I checked, I-65 runs north/south, and I-10 runs east/west....
Rating: Summary: Sophomore Slump Review: Mike Stewart, who wrote the incredible "Sins of the Brother", suffers through his sophomore slump with this newest novel, "Dog Island". Returning former-attorney Tom McInnes is back dodging bullets and bad guys, even though he insists he's "only an attorney". It seems that trouble just seems to find him no matter what...which would be to the benefit of everyone's entertainment if only "Dog Island" were as good as the first. The characters felt somehow less vibrant this time around, and didn't bring about the empathy or interest the author was aiming for. With too many predictable twists and turns, Stewart's writing feels as bogged down as the swamplands in which this second effort takes place. Basing this story on the witness of a grisly murder by a teenage runaway, Stewart continues the characterizations he introduced in "Sins of the Brother", though by mid-story, one hopes that they all meet untimely deaths, or at least decide to move to another state. While confusing multiple identities with plotline, "Dog Island" becomes only repetitive and dreary by the exceptional "seen-it-coming" ending. One would hope that this slump is only temporary, for the promise that "Sins..." showed us says that Stewart is very talented. Let's hope he's not a one-hit wonder!
Rating: Summary: Sophomore Slump Review: Mike Stewart, who wrote the incredible "Sins of the Brother", suffers through his sophomore slump with this newest novel, "Dog Island". Returning former-attorney Tom McInnes is back dodging bullets and bad guys, even though he insists he's "only an attorney". It seems that trouble just seems to find him no matter what...which would be to the benefit of everyone's entertainment if only "Dog Island" were as good as the first. The characters felt somehow less vibrant this time around, and didn't bring about the empathy or interest the author was aiming for. With too many predictable twists and turns, Stewart's writing feels as bogged down as the swamplands in which this second effort takes place. Basing this story on the witness of a grisly murder by a teenage runaway, Stewart continues the characterizations he introduced in "Sins of the Brother", though by mid-story, one hopes that they all meet untimely deaths, or at least decide to move to another state. While confusing multiple identities with plotline, "Dog Island" becomes only repetitive and dreary by the exceptional "seen-it-coming" ending. One would hope that this slump is only temporary, for the promise that "Sins..." showed us says that Stewart is very talented. Let's hope he's not a one-hit wonder!
Rating: Summary: Thrilling Review: See story summary above. An engaging mystery thriller set in the panhandle of Florida and parts of Alabama. The story moves at a good pace and provides plenty of thrills and some graphic violence. The lead character, Tom McInnes, seems to smart off quite a bit when he's surrounded by the enemy, which seems somewhat stupid, but other than that he's quite likable. An overall smoothly written novel laced with humor and bodies. I'm looking forward to the follow up to this novel, which is obviously to be expected, because of the unexpected.... Recommended for thrills and mystery.
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