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Summary: a tale steeped in the atmosphere of the English coast.
Review: Minnette Walters delivers a tale steeped in the atmosphere of the English coast. It is a setting both desolate and attractive. A place for families to vacation and at the same time foggy and forlorn.Ms Walters carefully examines many of the strange relationships formed by the characters in her book. In the world of The Breaker love and friendship are not always based on mutual like but mutual need. We see the many things that can go wrong with a world founded on need. We also get a glimpse of integrity in various loveless characters. The victim herself turns out to be very unsavory, but yet we are given another view of her that is more courageous - which is correct? The dichotomy of the characters in the book is perhaps the foundation of her mystery. What is each person really about - it is the readers choice in the end.
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Summary: A good yarn
Review: This author has settled down into a thoroughly reliablethriller writer. The plotting in this book is compelling although hardly any of the characters are at all appealing. The plot revolves around the sad and tawdry sex lives of the main protagonists and the author achieves this without descending into tawdriness herself. Thoroughly recommeded.
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Summary: my favorite of walter's books, so far....
Review: i have now read all of minette walter's books that i could get my hands on, and this was definitely my favorite. everytime you think you know who did it, something changes your mind. i also enjoyed how the different characters evolved throughout the novel. this one (like her others) i couldn't put down til i got to the end. i can't wait til she comes out with another book! one of my favorite things about her books is the way she writes statements in different typefaces, so you always differentiate who is narrating. another is that she always has a map at the front, which i tend to refer back to, just to keep a more accurate track of what's going on. i highly recommend this book.
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Summary: Not Only for Fans
Review: If you have never read a Minette Walters books before, this is an excellent introduction to her writing. If you have read any of her other books, you will not be disappointed with "The Breaker". From the moment you settle down and read the first chapter, you will find an exploration that you won't want to put down. The mastery of Walters' style is shown here as the story quickly devolves down to only two main suspects, yet the suspense is held to the very end. Definitely a miss-your-stop commuting read!
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Summary: I Can't Believe Ms. Walters Wrote This Book!
Review: I've read most of Ms. Walters' books and, except for The Breaker, they were suspenseful, page-turners. I guess I could call The Breaker a page-turner of sorts in that I turned the pages especially fast hoping to finish it--it was that bad. I found two main faults with this book. First, there was absolutely no suspense. I could have cared less who done it or why they did it. Second, none of the characters were especially appealing. I was either ambivalent about the character or I disliked reading about seedy and wimpy characters. Having given The Breaker down-the-road, I just want to mention again that Ms. Walters' previous books are outstanding and suspenseful, especially The Sculptress and The Dark Room.
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Summary: Engrossing
Review: This author's skills as a writer of suspense and good plotting continues to improve. The author's characters are well drawn, although only among the secondary cast list are any of them anywhere near likeable. The plot is compelling and not exploitative, despite its basis on a sexual assault and the sad and tawdry sex lives of the main protagonists. One relatively minor flaw is that the identification of the killer and the circumstances of the crime tumble out in a matter of a couple of pages or so. This leaves some questions unanswered and is a rather unsatisfactory way of concluding a story that has developed over the preceding three hundred pages. Nevertheless, a good read.
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Summary: The Breaker
Review: Another great book by Minette Walters. Once you open the book at the first page you are so engrossed it's hard to put it down. Wonderfully written and full of twists, suspence and suspects, a really good book to read.
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Summary: Lots of suspense, unsettling mystery.
Review: Minette Walters novels are full of characters who you can't decide whether to like or hate. This novel is no exception. While by no means my favorite Walters book, she stays true to her usual formula and it works. I'm looking forward to the next one.
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Summary: Intelligent psychological thriller
Review: This is the first book by Minette Walters I've read, after borrowing it from a friend to kill time on the train. The book is suspenseful all the way to the finish as the police pick up new clues, but the puzzles don't all resolve themselves coherently, and the motives and behavior of one of the central characters never become clear. The author has a lot of insight and imagination regarding human psychology, and gives her characters very well-defined personalities (with the one exception). It makes the good guys all the more sympathetic, and the crime suspects creepier. As the investigation digs deeper into the victim's background, the book almost becomes too dark to be enjoyable as light reading; but Walters adds a nice romantic subplot to keep things balanced.
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Summary: Minette Walters' worst to date
Review: I have been a big Minette Walters fan ever since The Sculptress hit the bookstores so I wasn't going to let a few bad reviews stop me from reading this one. I should have listened to the reviews. The book starts off well enough. I was pulled into the story right away. By the middle it started to drag a bit but it was the last 50 pages that just lost if for me completely. Until then I was going to give it 3 stars (down from 4 which I think the beginning of the book deserves) but the end is very disappointing. The story just stops. I can't think of another way to put it. It's like she's taking you along with her then just stops and says "OK it ends like this". Where was the wonderful denouement that we all expect out of a good mystery novel? Writers' first books have to be good. It's the only way a publisher will look at them. But once you're known, the money starts to pour in and so do the big advances. I think that the problem with this book was that Minette Walters' major motivation to write it was not a story dying to be given life but a large advance from her publisher. Let's hope the next one is better.
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