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Eleventh Hour: An FBI Thriller

Eleventh Hour: An FBI Thriller

List Price: $7.99
Your Price: $7.19
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: A Toss Up
Review: Father Michael Joseph Carver is murdered while hearing the late night confession of a murderer. Unknown to the murderer, a young homeless woman was waiting in the shadows of the church to speak with Fr. Carver and witnessed the murderer's exit from the confessional. The woman is Nicola (Nick) Jones who is on the run from a mysterious past and who does not wish to be connected with Fr. Carver's murder. Fr. Carver's twin brother, FBI Special Agent Dane Carver, is working with the local police to find his brothers killer. Dane personally takes Nick into protective custody when it becomes apparent that someone is trying to kill Nick. They discover that the killer is using the scripts of a popular television show to commit the murders. Dane calls in fellow FBI agents, Dillon and Sherlock Savitch to assist him in keeping Nick alive and finding the killer.

This is the first Catherine Coulter book I have read. The story line is good and there are multiple mysteries going on at the same time that kept me interested and guessing until the end. However, the interaction between the weakly built characters was astoundingly trite. The dialogue was embarrassingly silly and amateurish. It remains a toss up as to whether the plot and story line are good enough to offset the characters and the dialogue.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Two for the Price of One
Review: This is a fast moving, well plotted story with two two interrelated mysteries to solve.Father Michael Carver is murdered in his confessional in S.F. and the only witness is Nick Jones, a homeless woman on the run and with a desire to keep her past a secret. Father Michael's twin brother Dane,an FBI agent, of course devasted by the news of his brother's death,immediately rushes to SF from DC and unofficially joins the murder investigation being conducted by the local police.Dillon and Sherlock Savich, Dane's FBI compatriots, soon become involved when evidence of a serial killer develops.(While this is the first book by Coulter that I have read, it is clear that these are characters who have previously appeared in her series of FBI mysteries and readers of those books may be glad to become reacquainted with them.)
This is not an FBI procedural, but rather an action story (potential TV movie) with multiple plot twists and a plethora of suspects.The ingenious device of the murders mimicing a recent TV series adds further complications to the police investigation, as does the unknown relationship of the current events to Nick's past. And, as could be guessed, romance also manages to blossom as Dane and Nick become attracted to each other as they try to stay alive and solve the mysteries they both confront.
I was one for two, as I was kept guessing until the conclusion as to Father Michael's killer but did unravel the clues regarding Nick's real opponent.This had the advantage of being a fast read but still having a complicated plot and good character development. I definitely plan to read another one of the series both for enjoyment and in order see whether the author is simply a formulaic writer or sufficiently varies her stories to keep my interest.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: One time wonder
Review: I have to say, I use to love Catherine Coulter. She was one of my favorites. I loved the Maze! The Maze was faced paced and you really became to love the characters in the book. But since then I haven't loved her FBI stories. The Cove even seemed a bit off the wall. But the Target really turned me off with the "I" dialouge. But Since I have loved Catherine Coulter in the past I wanted to give this book another chance. I really loved the first chapter everything ran together so well. How the priest, and the homless girl in the church and the serial killer. I had so much poteintal. Then it just went flat and choppy. There were many things in the book like why? It doesnt matter in the scope of the book. For instance when Nick first made contact with the inspector, she called him dective,Well the writer in this book made it point to make sure he corrected her on this. I was like why? not important in the relm of things. I just found this extremely choppy writing. I kept glued to the book because i kept hoping that vintage Catherine would come out to play. But once again I have been let down and dissapointed. The story itself had so much potential but the ball was dropped. I am not sure if I am going to read any more of her books. At least I wont be buying them new. I want my original Catherine Coulter back.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Give me my money back!
Review: I have read all of Catherine Coulter's books in the last seven years, and spent a good chunk of money on them. Not only was this one chock full of bad dialogue, gruesome crimes and ridiculous cliches, but it didn't even deliver the cheesy thrills and romance I was expecting!

To top it all off, Coulter (perhaps related to Ann?) goes off on several vicious political tangents that really alienated me as a reader. Hey Ms. Coulter, your loyal fans give you hard-earned money for some entertainment, not your own views on how immoral public defenders are (thanks so much) or what you think of the impeachment scandal!

Either Ms. Coulter has lost her touch, or she needs to hire a new ghost-writer.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Middle of the Road
Review: I am a fan of Catherine Coulter and have read all of her FBI thrillers. Although her story lines are always great I find her conversational writing to be a bit stilted. This was the worst. I enjoyed the story line and the inter-twining of the two murder plots and felt they were fairly well thought out. The motorcycle scene was far fetched. The killer had to be the worst shot in the history of mystery novels. Also, the conversation between characters was extremely trite, silly and childish - more so than usual.

And to add one more sore spot, she added a new character at the end as the actual murderer going after Nick. I had to go back through the book to see if I missed something. I didn't. I had a pretty good idea who was after Nick but the actual shooter was a new character who was completely undeveloped.

I recommend reading the book but buy it used, get it from the library, or wait for the paperback. You won't want to keep it to read again later or spend a lot of money on the hardback.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: The absolute worst
Review: I've never read anything this bad, ever! This was the first time I read Coulter's work - can't believe why anyone would be interested, what with the poor plot and the artificial conversation.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Murder in the Confessional, No Absolution
Review: San Francisco, Father Michael is listening to the third confession of a killer and he can't take it anymore. He tells the killer he's going to have to go to his bishop. The killer shots through the confessional grate, killing the priest, then flees, but is seen by a young homeless woman, Nicola Jones.

Washington, Agent Dane Carver learns of his twin brother's death in California and that an anonymous woman had called in to report the murder. Carver goes west to investigate.

Back in San Francisco, Nicola finally goes to the police, but she is running from her own past and is afraid to tell them who she really is. Carver offers her protection, romance happens. Nic figures out the murders are following the script of a TV program and the search for the serial killer turns toward a Hollywood television studio and its popular primetime drama.

This book has murder, mystery, romance, a fast paced plot and a serial killer, which all add up to give it five stars.

Reviewed by Vesta Irene

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Fabulous beginning
Review: Midnight in a Catholic church, a woman is sitting in the shadows of the large sanctuary when she sees a dark-haired man enter to confess his sins to the waiting priest. After a muffled exchange with the kindly father, the "confessor" pulls a gun and kills the priest. The woman slumps deeper into the shadows so she's not detected by the killer. Wow! The priest even has an identical twin brother in law enforcement who helps find the perpetrator. I couldn't wait for the next chapter, and the next. Then the story drizzled down to trite, silly, and shallow. Too bad, it had so much promise.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Mixed feelings...
Review: I have to start out by saying I have read all of the books in the FBI series so far with the exception of Blindside, which I have yet to read. None of them have even come close to The Maze. I have been disappointed with all of them except for The Maze, which I will treasure forever. I honestly don't know if I would continue reading this series if it weren't for Sherlock and Savich (and I do wish they would have more interaction in the other novels, this one included).

Now, that being said, the reason I have mixed feelings about this particular novel is the following: I love the plot of this book and the mystery entwined within the pages. That was enough to make this a very quick read and keep me interested enough to find out what was going to happen and how everything ties in together. The downside? What most everyone said - the writing is lacking to say the least. I thought the first chapter was very well written but then it just seemed to go downhill from there. The dialogue is weak, flat, and often times unbelievable. It's really hard for me to say this because I really wanted to love this book. Development of characters was pretty much non-existent, which I thought was incredibly disappointing because I thought Dane and Nick had such potential as characters in this novel. Coulter seemed to just throw them together all of a sudden. One minute they were talking and then the next minute they were all over each other. I thought that scene was pretty unbelievable if only for the reason that the character development just wasn't present. I wanted to love their relationship but I just couldn't feel it. But in all her novels in the FBI series (with the exception of The Maze), romance was on the backburner and minor to the overall plot. Coulter doesn't work to develop relationships. She just throws characters together. These novels are all extremely dialogue-intensive. Coulter seems to want to leave the character's feelings, motivations, and development as open to interpretation by readers. Unfortunately, it also seems that she has gotten a little bit lazy with these novels following The Maze. It's hard not to be disappointed by that. I know she can do better than this...I have seen her do better than this. When I think about just how great this novel could have been, I can just shake my head. Don't get me wrong...If you try to push aside the dialogue and weaknesses and try to enjoy the mystery and plot, it is well worth the read. My recommendation would be to pick it up at the library though.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: I Really Tried To Like This Book
Review: After reading the story description on the book's jacket, I was truly looking forward to reading this story. However, the more I read, the more I became disappointed with these one dimensional characters and unbelievable coincidences. Two of these incidents occured twice in the story during plot twist, which made me really wish the author had given more thought.


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