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Dead Man's Island

Dead Man's Island

List Price: $6.99
Your Price: $6.29
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Not the Christie replacement her publisher would like
Review: Again, as with the last Hart i read, this is a good book, but there is something about it that i just do not like. In this case, i think, it has to do with the struture of the end: Henrie O is left, after all the action is over, writing to no purpose except directly to us, to unravel the final twist of the plot (and it's a doozy; Hart can develop surprising twists, no argument there). I don't like that feeling of being addressed directly (just as it is annoying when characters in films talk to the camera), unless it has been legitimised earlier in the book; in this case, it happens solely at the end, and with the specific purpose of surprising us. Secondly, and equally disappointingly, the twist is flawed: Henrie O's final solution is out of character for the person involved and is not an acceptable or believable answer to the problems set in the mystery. Hart is not by any means a replacement for Agatha Chistie -- her plotting is not sound enough -- but she is a good, quick, acceptable read for people who miss the Queen.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Wordy but not very mysterious
Review: Finished reading DEAD MAN"S ISLAND by Carolyn G. Hart. It is her first mystery with a new title character. After beginning reading the book I came across other people's critique of the book. After finishing, I agree. An elementary book with lots of words and a contrite ending. It is one they teach in writer's courses not to make. But she is selling books and I am not, so it shows you what I know.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Wordy but not very mysterious
Review: First off, Hart needs to learn a little bit more about just what can and can't be accomplished with your average laptop and modem (and their non-hacker owner). Then there were all those passages emphasizing the sleuth's journalistic background, which seemed out of place and amateurish. I hit on the solution quite early on in the book, but I still don't feel that the author did her best in setting it up as plausible. All in all, a rather tedious attempt at imitating the inimitable Christie.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Not up to her normal standards
Review: This book is not like the normal Henrie O mysteries I have read. I understand that this is her first in this series. That may explain why the book just wasn't a great one?!

The Henrie O mysteries are very different from the Annie and Max Darling mysteries. Henrie O is typically a strong woman who has lived through some tough times. She is able to be a stand up type of woman for those in trouble.

In this book however, I just remember thinking several times through out the book: What? or You have got to be kidding? or For Heaven's Sake... It just didn't click together. Much of what occured in this book just seemed so not real. For an author who writes Henrie O books that are fairly well grounded, this book was a dissapointment.

Although I might read this book again because I am generally a Hart fan, I don't know that I'd suggest it to many other people. I would suggest a different Henrie O story however.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Interesting whodunit!
Review: Wealthy, arrogant Chase Prescott invites his long-ago colleague Henrietta O'Dwyer Collins to come to his private island to try to determine who is trying to murder him. He tells her that an attempt has been made on his life and that he is determined to find the culprit. He invites anyone whom he feels had the motive and opportunity to Dead Man's Island (renamed Prescott Island by the egotistic Chase.) Henry O accepts his invitation and joins the others for a few days on the isolated, mysterious island off the coast of South Carolina. The problem she encounters is that everyone present does have a motive and that makes it difficult for her to find the culprit. The action becomes more exciting towards the end when a powerful hurricane threatens the island and murders begin to occur. The solution to the murder is a convoluted one which defies logic and which makes me wonder why Chase invited Henry O in the first place. The book is very readable, however, and gives the reader many pages of real suspense.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Interesting whodunit!
Review: Wealthy, arrogant Chase Prescott invites his long-ago colleague Henrietta O'Dwyer Collins to come to his private island to try to determine who is trying to murder him. He tells her that an attempt has been made on his life and that he is determined to find the culprit. He invites anyone whom he feels had the motive and opportunity to Dead Man's Island (renamed Prescott Island by the egotistic Chase.) Henry O accepts his invitation and joins the others for a few days on the isolated, mysterious island off the coast of South Carolina. The problem she encounters is that everyone present does have a motive and that makes it difficult for her to find the culprit. The action becomes more exciting towards the end when a powerful hurricane threatens the island and murders begin to occur. The solution to the murder is a convoluted one which defies logic and which makes me wonder why Chase invited Henry O in the first place. The book is very readable, however, and gives the reader many pages of real suspense.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Is it over yet?
Review: Who killed Chase Prescott? Who cares! By the time I got to end of the book, I was just happy to finish. I just couln't get involved in the characters, and relationship between the protagonist and the victim just didn't ring true...and that last chapter....shock value for shock value only. Possibly if a million pages (was it that many?) hadn't been devoted to the hurricane, that seemed totally irrevelevant to the story anyway.....and the prologue....what's up with that? Gimme Agatha Christie, but, then, I am just a rambling accountant.....


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