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Summary: Gary Krist's Bad Chemistry
Review: Gary Krist's 'Bad Chemistry' has an outstanding message within the literature of this book. The message is that no matter how well someone knows someone else, that they will undoubtedly be surprised. Joel Baker definitely suprised his wife Kate Baker within this book. He surprised his wife by disappearing, and leaving all of his secrets behind. Kate realizes that the Joel Baker that she knows is not the real Joel Baker; that he had a secret drug involvement, and many other secrets. Kate is determined to find the man that she married, and will do anything to accomplish this.When a friend of Joels, Jin Liang-Lu, another man involved in the drug ring, is murdered with his hands and head cut off, the surprises are full blown. All in all, Joels return is not for his wife, but for information that he left on his computer at their house. While this entire scenario is going on, Kate us becoming closer friends with the boy who found Jin's body, Evan Potter. Everyone who reads this book can identify with at least one character or one point of view, and get the same message. That even those who are close, can be very surprising.
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Summary: Gary Krist's Bad Chemistry
Review: Gary Krist's 'Bad Chemistry' has an outstanding message within this fine piece of literature. The message is that no matter how well someone knows someone knows someone else, they will undoubtedly be surprised. Joel Baker definitely surprises his wife Kate within this book. He surprises her by disappearing, and leaving his drugs from his drug ring behind. Kate is held aghast by this and is determind to find the man she married only three years prior. When Jin Liang Lu, another member of Joel's secret life is found brutally murdered, Kate's suspiscion increases dramatically. All in all, Joel's return was not for Kate, but for information off of their home computer. While this scenario is going on, Kate is getting closer to they boy who found Jin's body, Evan Potter. Everyone can relate to a character within this book, or a point of view, or the message. The message being that even the people closest to your heart will have a few surprises along with them.
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Summary: Smashing fun with humor linked to horror!
Review: Gary Krist's Bad Chemistry was a quick one day read with some new twists; smart drugs and Internet intrigue.Krist takes a probing look at relationships at all levels in this book, specifically those surrounding his protagonist, Kate Theodorus-Baker.Kate is believable and vulnerable while maintaining the necessary toughness to survive her nightmare. Her husband Joel's secret life is shocking yet the reader is left wondering why she didn't pick up any clues, given her police background. There was considerable time spent developing her Chicago past, which might have been better spent more fully exploring their relationship. Plot depth notwithstanding, it was a fun read raising my awareness level of smart drugs and exploring the limits of trust.
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Summary: Look, Honey, The Dog Is On Fire
Review: Gazing out into their backyard Kate and Leon note that the neighbor's dog is engulfed in flames. Immediately ruling out spontaneous combustion as the cause of this unusual event, the couple decides that the dog burning is a forewarning of something ominous. Later that same day Leon goes to the store for some microwave popcorn, and never returns. Much later a burglar breaks into the house in the middle of the night. Kate now feels that something is really wrong, and the police, after finding drugs during their search of the house, totally agree. I thought that this might really be an interesting tale, what with the burning dog and all. Sadly the story never really comes alive. Turns out that lighting a dog on fire is simply a message meaning "See me at once, I have bad news." Clever way to communicate; really beats the risk of using the telephone. Well, anyway, Kate and her sidekick 14 year old Evan (yes, 14 is correct) take off after the bad guys. Is her husband alive or isn't he? Is he mixed up in some sort of designer drug lab? Are two recent deaths connected to her husband's disappearance? Will another canine be torched? These are the questions that Bad Chemistry sets out to answer. Will the 14 year old kid do something really stupid? You don't need to read the book, of course, to answer that last question. It's not a bad book. It's just an average one, a modestly entertaining easily forgettable tale. So forgettable that I raced to type this review before the story evaporated from memory.
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Summary: Starts promisingly but ends with a thud.
Review: In "Bad Chemistry," Kate Baker is a former cop, nowturned social worker, who has married Joel Baker and moved toWashington, D. C. Kate's husband suddenly disappears under mysterious circumstances... The book starts out well. Kate is a sympathetic and smart character and we root for her to get to the bottom of Joel's disappearance without coming to any harm herself. Unfortunately, the books goes badly off track at the halfway point. Kate becomes Nancy Drew as she runs around interrogating anyone who might shed light on what her husband has been up to.... ...the ending of the book is not believable and the conclusion is unsatisfying and pointless. This is too bad, since the book had some promise that was ultimately unfulfilled.
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Summary: Like reading an outline for a novel
Review: It's the white-knuckle thriller that's a cut-above the genre. Great page-turning fun with the surprise of quite excellent writing. Terrific plot with modern twists, as well as good character development and emotion. Mink felt this to be a cut above, while still providing an easy, fun escape.
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Summary: Different & interesting.
Review: Krist's style was clean and straightforward, and the plot, hinging on smart drugs, was interesting to me. I found this via mystery, but Berkley calls it general fiction and I think that's more accurate. At first, there was a paradigm shift in how I read this since it wasn't closer to the mystery genre (sometimes I like more formulaic easy reads) but this was worth it. Three elements that struck me. First, this book felt as if it were starting mid-series, and not in a bad way. I was interested in Kate's past as a cop, and by the end of the book I was hoping for a chance to read about her again. Second, the supporting character of Evan, a misfit teenage boy, was an odd and uneasy choice -- but the character development was subtle and fascinating. Third, the whole smart drugs driven plot was intrinsically interesting; the point of view on it, through Kate, was conventional, but the author's view may have been slightly more balanced. There was a whole backstory from the husband's point of view that we didn't see; I would not have minded reading this interwoven with Kate's even though the mystery surrounding him was the vehicle for the plot. I picked up on some similarities to Particia Cornwell, but it may just have been the setting and a few chance resonances. I can't really think of any one author this reminds me of (which is good); Carol O'Connell, maybe, but with the more focused humanity of a Thomas Cook. I went out and looked for more of Krist's work but it's hard to find and apparently this is his first supsense-type outing. I hope to read many more.
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Summary: boring, generic
Review: This book is extremely boring and uninteresting. It is not different, it is the same kind of thing that has been written a million times.
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Summary: Great Chemistry
Review: This is a tremendously entertaining novel.. Gary Krist has an excellent ear for dialogue and his heroine is likeable and appealingly flawed. It's a taut, gripping book that makes you think while you're plowing through the plot at breakneck speed, with more than enough twists and surprises to satisfy even the most jaded thriller reader. Best of all, it manages to go beyond the sex and violence that too often define the genre.
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Summary: A Different Kind of Drug Thriller
Review: This is a very cool take on biotechnology and the new pharmacology. Most thrillers about drugs are about the usual recreational kind, but this one is about designer drugs that can change the way you are--that let you, in a sense, choose WHO you want to be. That plays into the character theme of the novel. We can "design" our consciousnesses, but does that mean we can know each other any better than we did before? Krist doesn't think so. The writing is also great here--very smart, interesting. And the two main characters are really fascinating, especially the fourteen-year-old kid, who may be one of the weirdest dudes in contemporary literature.
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