Rating: 
Summary: Intrigue at every turn
Review: Once again Michael Connelly has come up with a winner. Mr. Connelly has come up with a new main character, Jack McEvoy,
who is every bit as interesting as Harry Bosch. "The Poet" is about Jack McEvoy's twin brother, a cop, who is killed
by a serial killer, only Jack is the only one who's been
able link the many deaths together. He finally convinces
the FBI and the hunt is on.
The ending to this book is just unbelievable!
Rating:
Summary: The blurbs are true!!
Review: Mr. Connelly's books are frightful: full of fright and frightening to to discover a new one. I know that I am going to suffer some real sleep deprivation whenever there is a new one. And work is going to suffer big time the next day.
"The Poet" has the most evil perp in memory. I could not put the thing down waiting for him to get whacked. And THEN!!!
Do yourself a favor. Quit reading this Connelly guy. Maybe he'll find something else to do, other people to torment. I know I'm going to try. Probably. Maybe.
Well, maybe just one more.
Rating:
Summary: Forget about sleeping!
Review: Michael Connelly is a Master wordsmith. "The Poet", Connelly's fifth book - and the first to not feature Harry Bosch - is a sleep-stealer! Crisp, fresh, beautifully crafted sentences painted pictures in my mind; I "saw" this
story as it unfolded. Write on!, Michael. I can hardly wait
for your next book.
Rating:
Summary: A tense thriller by a unique voice in crime fiction.
Review: It seems that these days everybody wants to write another Silence Of The Lambs. So yeah, we've got a serial killer at large. And a suicide that may be a suicide, but then again, this is a thriller, so nothing's what it seems. Oh, and more FBI agents than you could shake a Smith and Wesson 1076 at. And a trail of dead cops. Okay, Mr Connelly, I thought, I think I know where we're going with this one.
I'm afraid I couldn't sustain my cultivated air of jaded cynicism beyond the first chapter. Connelly's sparse and incisive prose led me through the myriad plot twists; the cool journalistic style mirroring the character of Jack McEvoy, the crime-beat reporter whose intention to write about his police officer brother's apparent suicide turns into a high-pace search for a killer who quotes Edgar Allen Poe.
Added to this is the most memorable killer since Hannibal Lecter and a chilling climax that really sets it above the rest. The brilliance of its construction, the clever way in which everything snaps into place like a well oiled clip into a Colt 45 automatic, left me breathless.
Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Another Edgar award winner
Review: By far the best of his 5 published novels. A change from the first 4, H. Bosch novels. This ones grips you by the
throat in the first chapter and never relents. A superb story teller who should be at the top of the
bestseller lists. There no rhyme or reason why you should take my recommendation, but try it you will be
enthralled. Brilliant.
Rating:
Summary: A great serial killer story
Review: While this story lacks his main central character Harry bosch, it is still, i am sure, going to end up as one of his best books ever. (Along with "The Concrete Blonde"). The plot is original and compelling (if a tad far-fetched, but i can live with that. fiction is, by its definition, not supposed to be real.) and adds much to the genre. The motive for the killing is good, but its description lacks a certain empathy, which i feel would have given this book even more dimension. Jack McEvoy is a very likeable character, and his quest to discover more about his brother's supposed suicide is written with emotion, feeling, and conviction. Rachel Walling, his obligatory love-interest, is also likeable, and when the two get together first, you really want it to suceed. The killer is chilling, and the way he kills is also so. The conclusion is great...you think it's all over, and then Connelly just finds more and more to hit you with, playing with the reader's expectations and assumptions, and finally trumping them with a nice twist to head it all off. If you're a fan of the serial killer genre, this would be a very good novel to reach for.
Rating: 
Summary: The Ultimate 'Cop'-out again!
Review: Stephen King gushes in his promo for this novel but after navigating 500 pages to a "Cop"-out of an ending, I wondered if we had read the same book. Besides the problems with the ending, the bulk of the novel is grossly overwritten, padded almost. Was he paid by the word on this one? On the plus side, as a career news reporter myself, I enjoyed the characters and the book was quick to read. But I threw it across the room when I started to sniff the final twist and yelled: "Not another one of these..." I won't give the ending away but I will accuse Connelly of taking the lazy way to a twist that makes no sense at all. Also, the love story is ludicrous.
Rating:
Summary: A very good book
Review: I have just re-read "The Poet", which is the book that got me onto Michael Connelly, and I see again why I liked it the first time around. I remember thinking at the time that the ending was "Hollywood", in that it seemed that the author wanted a film made out of it. Not necessarily bad; just different. You can't expect an author to bring out perfection every time, and the variety you get from trying out these sorts of things is usually a good thing. What's good about the book? Great gritty descriptions; interesting characters; great dialogue; very interesting plot. It's the sort of thing that will captivate you if you're interested. And you have to pay attention. Some reviewers have bitched about the book, saying "people can't kill or hurt someone else while under hypnosis". That's true. But, if you read carefully, no-one in the book does. Other people complain about the ending being totally "fake" or "unpredictable". If you pay attention as you read, you'll notice a number of subtle clues that point the way. Probably too subtle for some. Re-reading this book is like watching "Basic Instinct" or "The Usual Suspects" a second time; you get a lot more out of it. And some people complain that the plot has holes -- on reflection, I can't agree. I thought it was very tightly (and very well) plotted. Things pull together at the end, not apart. The bad parts? There aren't many. .... All in all, grab this book. If you like it, or even if you like most of the book but not the ending, you will like Connelly's others.
Rating:
Summary: Intriguing
Review: This is the first book I've read by Mr. Connelly and I found it to be a great read. Jack McEvoy is a crime reporter whose twin brother, a homicide investigator, is brutally murdered. Although the police rule the death a suicide, Jack is unable to accept this and begins his own investigation. This leads to the discovery of similar murders involving other homicide investigators across America, and the FBI becomes involved. Jack is allowed to be part of the investigation and becomes involved with Rachel Walling, an agent with the FBI. This mystery is full of twists and turns and is a fascinating read. The characters are great, the investigation intriguing, and the real Poet a surprise. Call me a fan.
Rating:
Summary: OMG !!
Review: I had purchased this book mainly due to the reviews that I had been reading. (Note: I do not normally read murder/mystery genra...I tend to lean towards historical and occult fiction, yet as a book fanatic, I try not to limit myself ;) "The Poet" is the first I have read by M. Connelly, and I have to say of all the books that I have read, this one scared the bejeasus out of me!! I proudly would have stated that I can't be frightened by a book, I had read it all, there wasn't a hack and slash or horror out there I would have been surprised by...until now. The story is centered around a reporter, Jack McEnvoy. It begins with Jack's need to question the motives surrounding his brothers suicide. In a reporters need to uncover the 'reason' for things happening, Jack finds odd clues that soon lead him to understand that his brother, (a Denver Homicide Detective), was really murdered and his death can be linked with the deaths of other homicide detectives around the country. (It is never that simple in fiction though is it?:) In each death, the detective was working on a high profile case involving the murder of a person/child who was killed in horribly brutal and violent ways, each case lead the investigators to a brick wall. Soon Jack realizes that there may be TWO serial killers out there working together, how could one guy do all this? He scrambles on a journey to 'catch a killer..' and find the answers that have been unanswered surrounding his brother's death. The story catches your interest, keeps it hanging and blows you from one theory to the next. Just when you think you know the answer to 'who done it', he blows your theory out of the water. His writing is such that you don't get the heads up of what is going on much before the lead character, Jack, does. I found the dialog a bit stilted at times, but overall the book read more like a movie playing out than it did an actual novel. The reason I had to give 5 stars was the scare factor. Although most of what I tend to read would creep the jadded readers out, MC writes about a horror that could be lurking in your town, right now. Reality, and the perception of the deviant minds of our fellow human beings was portrayed so well, that I was afriad to read the next page, but couldn't force myself to stop. When Steven King prefaced in the intro about 'sleeping with the lights on', he wasn't blowing smoke!! This book creeps you out in a way that no witch, demon, or blood ceremony can!! It makes you think that the guy you ran into at the grocery store or your English Professor could be "him....like that..". It makes you want the ability to read your fellow human minds just to be sure there isn't some kind of disturbed mind lurking in there just waiting to get out to butcher and slaughter you! Sure that sounds a bit fanciful and a dramatic raving of a book, but as I said, I don't read this genra often. I think I will now though. Nothing says 'I am a 34 yr. old sleeping with the lights on' like a novel about the scariest monster/demon of all....the human!!
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