The Killing Hour

Rating:
Summary: First Time Reader
Review: The Killing Hour was the first Lisa Gardner book I read and I'm now hooked on her style of writing. She is an absolute genius when it comes to developing a well plotted suspense novel. Ms. Gardner uses her reader's anticipation to a new high by posting the time and location of each chapter. You can almost feel the sweat dripping off your forehead as you read about how hot it is. You're right there as each character manages to deal with the heat and the clock ticking down.

Excellent story. I'm looking forward to reading Lisa Gardner's next book.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting Read, Excellent Author
Review: This is my first book by this author. I happened to pick it up in a train station on the way out of town and liked the title. While I could appreciate the great details and forensic evidence revealed in the book (much like Jeffrey Deaver's Lincoln Rhyme) the book moved just a little too slow for me and took me a while to finish. I enjoyed the protagonist Kimberly Quincy. She was a complicated soul with much baggage after the murders of her mother and sister at the hands of a madman. I could feel Kimberly's pain as she frantically searched to find at least one victim alive. The only thing in the book that seemed unrealistic to me was the Nora character having slight psychic abilities. It might have been better to bring her back into the realm of things in another manner. I do intend to read other books by this bestselling author because I like her style.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: When I read Ms Gardner's first book back in 1999, I was completely utterly blown away by the pace and plotting. I always looked forward to her novels because she was a "quality" writer and you always knew she would always turn out a satisfying thriller. Sadly not this time, like last years " Survivor's Club" this started off quite well but soon become cumbersome with long phrases like " They had to reach Tina because the clock was ticking and the madman was going to kill her" and the hysterical last few pages where everyone is throwing themselves at each other and going on about how much they love each other was plainly boring and I was skipping sentences just to get past that gooey crap. Please don't read this daft book and read any of Dennis Lehane's fine novels instead.