Crashing Down

Rating:
Summary: In Depth Feelings
Review: Crashing down was an exempelary book and well written. You could feel the turmoil and pain that Carrie Holt was experiencing and feeling.Child abuse was covered up and ignored in the past.It brought forth an enlighment to that ugly situation.The plot, the story,was exciting as well as suspensful.It kept me turning page after page, not wanting to put the book down (but then, all Meg O'Brien's books have that effect on me).I enjoyed this book well enough to read twice I thank the author for a great novel, you could feel the emotions running high.

Rating:
Summary: Crashing Down
Review: I bought this paperback last year. It was one of the best I've read. Highly emotional, exciting characters - everything a book needs. The abuse factor was so real it had to have happened to the author. Ms. O'Brien is one of the finest authors. I am now reading Sacred Trust - truely a page turner. I found Crashing Down chilling also, trying to deal with the abuser and the basement thing still scares me. I would read it again. Thanks, Meg.

Rating:
Summary: AN EXTREMELY GOOD MYSTERY NOVEL!
Review: I just discovered Meg O'Brien about a week ago and decided to give "Crashing Down" a try. I fullfillingly enjoyed the whole novel. It says on the cover "If you like Mary Higgins Clark, then you'll love Meg O'Brien," that is definitely TRUE! She's just as good. The story revolves around a woman named Carrie, who was sexually abused at age eight by her father, who was a pastor, and by a teacher who worked in her father's church. Carrie is now about thirty and has moved away from her hometown. Her father is long dead at this point and she has tried to forget about the teacher who raped her. Carrie's now an prolific author who writes books about abuse and children. She is invited to speak at a function back in her hometown, she nervously accepts. Carrie is even more startled to discover that the main head speaker is man named Christopher. HE WAS THE SAME MAN WHO MOLESTED HER WHEN SHE WAS YOUNG! He is now the new Mr. Rogers, the host and sponsor of a child's program! Carrie is shocked and is determined to bring down this monster before he can abuse more children. She turns to local cop named Nick, but is afraid to give away too much. Carrie goes to confront Chris at the local church but he isn't there and she meets one of Chris's followers, a little girl named Tess, who looks sore and red on her legs. Carrie then discovers that her sister who was a teenager committed sucicide a few months earlier. Is Christopher still molesting little girls or is there another person who follows in Chris's tradition? This is an amazing and somewhat frightening novel of suspense. If you are a fan of Erica Spindler, Helen R. Myers, or Christiane Heggan, then you'll love this book!

Rating:
Summary: I'm sorry, but
Review: I just discovered Meg O'Brien about a week ago and decided to give "Crashing Down" a try. I fullfillingly enjoyed the whole novel. It says on the cover "If you like Mary Higgins Clark, then you'll love Meg O'Brien," that is definitely TRUE! She's just as good. The story revolves around a woman named Carrie, who was sexually abused at age eight by her father, who was a pastor, and by a teacher who worked in her father's church. Carrie is now about thirty and has moved away from her hometown. Her father is long dead at this point and she has tried to forget about the teacher who raped her. Carrie's now an prolific author who writes books about abuse and children. She is invited to speak at a function back in her hometown, she nervously accepts. Carrie is even more startled to discover that the main head speaker is man named Christopher. HE WAS THE SAME MAN WHO MOLESTED HER WHEN SHE WAS YOUNG! He is now the new Mr. Rogers, the host and sponsor of a child's program! Carrie is shocked and is determined to bring down this monster before he can abuse more children. She turns to local cop named Nick, but is afraid to give away too much. Carrie goes to confront Chris at the local church but he isn't there and she meets one of Chris's followers, a little girl named Tess, who looks sore and red on her legs. Carrie then discovers that her sister who was a teenager committed sucicide a few months earlier. Is Christopher still molesting little girls or is there another person who follows in Chris's tradition? This is an amazing and somewhat frightening novel of suspense. If you are a fan of Erica Spindler, Helen R. Myers, or Christiane Heggan, then you'll love this book!

Rating:
Summary: I'm sorry, but
Review: I loved Meg O'Brien's Jesse James series and was disappointed when they ended. I read Gathering Lies - the first O'Brien book I read since that first series and really liked the book. It was very good. But Crashing Down? I agree with one reviewer. The author should have just written her own life story instead trying to fit it into a suspense novel about other people. I found this book very dark and hard to get thru - meaning there just wasn't anything there - nothing compelling you to read. I made it to 2/3 thru and just skimmed the rest. I didn't like the character development of Nicky and I didn't get much in the way of a growing love relationship between Nicky and Callie. Her descriptions of the abuse scenes were chilling, especially since you knew from the forward that they were based on her own experiences, but the rest of the book seemed to be lacking something. I tried to read to the end, but just gave up.

Rating:
Summary: Why didn't the author keep it simple?
Review: The introduction to this book makes it clear that the author is to some extent drawing on her own experience of being abused as a child and, probably for that reason, the sections of the book dealing with the abuse of the central character are powerful and moving. Why didn't she stick to that? Sure the central theme 'successful authoress abused by famous evangelist' (no spoilers the blurb on the back cover is fairly explicit about this) was enough? Why does she feel she has to drag in so many other characters and (sometimes unbelievable) storylines? The story starts out powerfully and then get bogged down in all these thriller-by-numbers conventions. By the end I had lost interest altogether and skimmed ahead to the end to see what happened - a sure sign that an author has lost the plot.

The blurb at the front of the novel 'if you love Mary Higgins Clarke you love Meg O'Brien' did worry me - but in fact MHC, though her novels are too formulaic for my taste can at least write a concise gripping thriller. Meg O'Brien, on the evidence of 'Crashing Down', can't - though she can write - as some sections of the book show. A semi-autobiographical account of her own experiences and feelings would have been a much better than have them embodied in a standard and uninteresting storyline ...

Rating:
Summary: Little romance but a great book to read
Review: There was not a lot of romance, but a very good book. There is a lot of man-female relationship, but not the mushey kind. This book was very hard to put down. It kept you wondering.