Rating: 
Summary: Your Basic Kellerman
Review: If you like Jonathan Kellerman, you'll like this book--but some of the author's most annoying traits are rife in this particular outing, and they frankly drove me crazy.First, the plot: Therapist Alex Delaware teams up with his police pal Milo Sturgis to help solve what seems at first to be a run-of-the-mill double murder: a young couple have been murdered while parked on a lovers' lane. But these murders are particularly and horribly brutal. The woman has not only been shot, but skewered with an iron bar. It's a big case of overkill, and a little digging unearths a particularly nasty underbelly to the murder and its aftermath.
As Milo and Alex dig into the multiple webs that surround this murder and its motive, the plot gets increasingly difficult, so that the reader has to stop more than once to unravel the latest string and put it in context. I know the author meant that to reflect the puzzle that the two are trying to solve, but it stopped me cold more than once. And the other thing that stopped me cold many, many times was the endlessly intricate narration of streets and routes that Kellerman affects in each of his books. I grew up in LA. The streets are all real, and I know most of them. So when he says, "I drove down Robertson to Pico," I know exactly what he is talking about, and I have to stop reading to visualize it. This time out, he actually gets into the minute details of a neighborhood in which I grew up, and we're talking streets, hills, even foliage. WHY does he do this? Does anybody in the entire world need to know the in-depth "Mapquest" routing of every ride that Delaware takes? It's gone from simple author quirk to something so annoying that it takes away from each and every book he writes, and this one truly is the worst. I can't say that "Therapy" isn't a fun book, especially as summertime reading. I finished it in a day. But be warned: Unless you enjoy map-reading for fun and pleasure, prepare to be annoyed throughout the otherwise fast-paced mystery.
Rating: 
Summary: Psychologist, heal thyself.
Review: In Jonathan Kellerman's latest thriller, "Therapy," Los Angeles psychologist Alex Delaware and homicide detective Milo Sturgis investigate the brutal murder of a young man and his girlfriend. The two victims, Gavin Quick and the unidentified woman who was found with him, were parked in a lonely area outside of Los Angeles when they were both shot in the head. Delaware, who consults for the Los Angeles Police Department, lends his psychological expertise to the investigation. Sturgis and Delaware learn that Gavin had been seeing a popular therapist named Dr. Mary Lou Koppel, an egotistical publicity hound who is a frequent guest on radio and television talk shows. Milo and Alex are startled to learn that one of Koppel's former female patients had also been brutally murdered. Can the murders of Gavin Quick and this female patient somehow be related? "Therapy" is a talky novel in which Sturgis and Delaware spend most of their time interviewing dozens of people, sometimes more than once. In between interviews, they frequent various restaurants and bars while they mull over the particulars of the case. Slowly, Alex and Milo begin to shed some light on this complicated mystery. The plot of "Therapy" is engrossing and the characters are lively enough. One aspect of the book that I found interesting is that the author, himself a respected clinical psychologist, depicts three psychologists in "Therapy" who have bad judgment and questionable ethics. Although the book would have been even stronger with tighter editing, "Therapy" is still an entertaining thriller with some original twists and turns.
Rating:
Summary: Psychologist, heal thyself.
Review: In Jonathan Kellerman's latest thriller, "Therapy," Los Angeles psychologist Alex Delaware and homicide detective Milo Sturgis investigate the brutal murder of a young man and his girlfriend. The two victims, Gavin Quick and the unidentified woman who was found with him, were parked in a lonely area outside of Los Angeles when they were both shot in the head. Delaware, who consults for the Los Angeles Police Department, lends his psychological expertise to the investigation. Sturgis and Delaware learn that Gavin had been seeing a popular therapist named Dr. Mary Lou Koppel, an egotistical publicity hound who is a frequent guest on radio and television talk shows. Milo and Alex are startled to learn that one of Koppel's former female patients had also been brutally murdered. Can the murders of Gavin Quick and this female patient somehow be related? "Therapy" is a talky novel in which Sturgis and Delaware spend most of their time interviewing dozens of people, sometimes more than once. In between interviews, they frequent various restaurants and bars while they mull over the particulars of the case. Slowly, Alex and Milo begin to shed some light on this complicated mystery. The plot of "Therapy" is engrossing and the characters are lively enough. One aspect of the book that I found interesting is that the author, himself a respected clinical psychologist, depicts three psychologists in "Therapy" who have bad judgment and questionable ethics. Although the book would have been even stronger with tighter editing, "Therapy" is still an entertaining thriller with some original twists and turns.
Rating:
Summary: Uneven Delaware story -- almost too complex a plot
Review: Kellerman fans (the people that really know all his books), as opposed to the "professional" reviewers, will find this latest psychologist Alex Delaware novel, as usual featuring co-star gay detective Milo Sturgis, somewhat puzzling. If we didn't know Alex and Milo well, we might well find their characters enigmatic, with inconsistent action and a pursuit of the clues that borders on hobbyist. When a young couple is found murdered, with an unnecessary impalement of the female victim, Milo and Doc Delaware pick up the case almost on a whim since they were nearby. [Apparently Sturgis can partner with Alex almost at will -- how his presumably high bills get paid is conveniently never addressed...] While the male is quickly ID'd, it takes much of the book to discover who the female is, generating much of what true suspense there was. The rest of the plot gets embroiled with a loosely knit firm of three psychologists specializing in private patient therapy (hence the title) who, as the plot unfolds, seem to be involved in a highly shady billing scheme involving ex-cons as both patients and, well, patient pimps. Before it's over, one of the three gets offed, the murdered boy's father disappears, and the storyline twists and turns in the wind. The ending is unusually inconclusive, with our stars making some very interesting value judgments about which bad guys to pursue and which not, an outcome we perceived as ridiculously unrealistic. Kellerman has always been a good story teller, but it seems his quality varies more widely as his quantity increases. Delaware's love life, frequently a tiresome thing with "ex" Robin, is a little more normal with new lover Allison, but their shop talk gets to be a bit much. A token cameo by Robin and her dog was just silly filler, and the scenes with Delaware playing "good cop / bad cop" with Sturgis went down poorly. We were more than tired of the multiple bad guys, and by the end barely cared who did what. This strikes us as a book that needed to be edited better -- improve the professionalism of the principles; shorten the billing fraud thing which should be contained to the sub-plot that it is (we can figure out ourselves it provides motive); and humanize the dead boy's family by opening up the true facts sooner; and we might have something here. As it is, it's a lukewarm entry in the series.
Rating: 
Summary: Kellerman Sparkles
Review: Kellerman has written yet another page-turning Delaware mystery/who-dunnit - and how he continues to shine and keep his character's fresh in such a long series is a tribute to style, imagination and fine writing. Gavin Quick is found murdered with an unknown young blonde in a compromising, sexual situtation. The questions don't lay with the Jane Doe but with Quick and his twisted, tangled past and a most dysfuntional family.
More murders follow leading the reader down an ever increasing complex path of characters, lead's and misinformation that only Milo Sturgis and Alex Delaware can delve thru and handle in their own unquie way. I enjoyed the abscense for once of Alex's complicated love life and Kellerman's concentration on good old story telling.
The ending left some loose ends which in my opionion was appropriate to this plot. All-around def. one of Kellerman's best!
Rating:
Summary: Fast Read, But.....
Review: Kellerman weaves his usual complex and detail-oriented plot in this newest Delaware book, but I found myself getting frustrated with the rather convoluted plot and resolution, and glad I'd finally finished the read. One thing that I believe the author needs to do and hasn't done in this long series is provide more detail on Milo's home life with Rick, even from Alex's 'I' viewpoint. Milo is an integral character, and we barely have scratched the surface of how he is in a non-police situation with his long-time partner, Rick. Come on: how about a plot that brings Rick and their homelife into an integral case so that we can get a better look at this special character?
Rating:
Summary: So-so
Review: Kellerman's latest, Therapy is a so-so read. I guess after awhile of reading the same repetitive plots using different characters, it can become tiresome to a reader. If you'd like to read a different type novel that's compelling, riveting, eye-opening drama, read LUST OF THE FLESH by Beverly Rolyat. It's about a corrupted district attorney who finds himself caught up in a web of deceipt, destruction, lies, lust, betrayal, murder, mystery, suspense, romance and sex galore! Is he really the biological father of his ex-wife's promiscuous daughter's infant son? Or has he been set up? LOTF is an enlightening read through and through. Happy reading.
Rating:
Summary: You talk too much
Review: Not as engaging as the most recent entries in the series. This story moves focus away from Milo. Additionally the ending is unsatisfactory, leaving a bad guy beyond reach.
Rating:
Summary: Delaware takes on pop psychology
Review: Psychologist Alex Delaware again teams up with his gay, dour homicide cop friend Milo Sturgis to investigate the double murder of a young couple on a lonely lovers' lane in the LA hills. It's not the first - or the last - work of this particular killer and the trail leads into the big-money world of pop-psychology and government-subsidized real estate. Much of Kellerman's popularity rests on compulsive readability. It's an elusive quality, relying on character and plot development more than action. But this time Kellerman seems to be going through the motions, putting his characters through their paces on a paint-by-numbers set, and that engaging readability fizzles out early.
Rating:
Summary: Very satisfying read
Review: Psychologist Alex Delaware, now a full-time consultant to the Los Angeles Police Department and his friend Milo Sturgis are called into a homicide investigation. It looks like a lover's lane murder. Two kids, clothing undone, both with bullet holes in their heads. But his psychology training tells Alex that something is wrong with that picture. The sharp post stuck through the woman's chest speaks of anger and intention. As they can't identify the woman, though, Milo and Alex begin investigating the young man. Gavin Quick had been in a personality-changing auto accident and was seeing a psychologist--a woman who had lost another client to murder a year earlier. Alex's instincts tell him that something is wrong, that coincidence does not explain these facts. Still, there is something deeper going on and Milo and Alex have plenty of time to explore every lead. Author Jonathan Kellerman creates a twisty and involved thriller. Although THERAPY lacks the emotional punch of some of Kellerman's early child-abuse mysteries, the story exposes Kellerman's talent for connecting pieces together to gradually unveil a larger conspiracy. Nothing is as it initially seems to be and some of the nicest people in the story turn out to be much worse than they appear. THERAPY combines a bit of psychological profiling with police investigation and with exciting action to add up to a very satisfying read.
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