Category Archives: Suspense Novels

Jason Kills Off Cinderella’s Stepmother, Lady Tremaine

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I haven’t posted a Jason update in a long while. To catch you all up, he’s finished all his Pathway courses . . . except the dreaded Math. He’ll be taking that one come January. In the meantime, he’s enjoying some freedom, and the only assignment he has these days is to learn how to make his own grilled cheese sandwiches. He’s halfway there and I’ll be posting about that next Friday, complete with pictures.

(Part of the reason we’re not pushing the driving, the math, or the mission right now is that we’re getting ready to list our house and looking into moving to Southern Utah. We want to downsize, be closer to both our families, and give Jason more opportunities to meet other LDS singles. But more about all of that in future posts.)

As I wrote on Monday, to help pass the time while driving down to Salt Lake City (and then on to St. George), I reviewed Agatha Christie’s writing methodology with Jason and proposed we give it a try. He agreed and so, first, we had to come up with a plausible victim who would have enemies.

JASON:  How about Lady Tremaine?

ME:  Who?

JASON:  You know, the stepmother from Disney’s “Cinderella?”

Lady Tremaine

ME:  Oh, yeah. Okay, she’ll do. Now we need to come up with the murder method.

He thought about that for a minute and shrugged. So I prodded his recollection of her fondness for shopping.

ME:  We could kill her off during a shopping trip in town.

JASON:  Huh? How?

ME:  Let’s see . . . since Agatha Christie was into poison, let’s come up with a really sneaky way to poison her while shopping.

JASON:  (No response)

ME:  Okay, how about this? . . . The killer applies an odorless poison to a dress Lady Tremaine has admired before, counting on the fact that she’ll likely try it on. Once she does, the toxic concoction seeps into her skin and 2-3 days later, she’s dead.

JASON:  Cool!

Now that we had the victim and the method all set, we had to determine the killer.

JASON:  It can’t be Cinderella and it can’t be the Prince. That would just be wrong.

Cinderella and the prince

ME:  Okay, who else wouldn’t like Lady Tremaine? Who else would have a motive and yet probably be overlooked by the reader?

JASON:  Maybe Anastasia would work.

ME:  Who?

JASON:  You know, the younger daughter. The one who was sort of kind to Cinderella . . . at least in the sequels.

Anastasia

ME:  That’s good. People probably wouldn’t suspect her because of that. But what would her motive be? Doesn’t she like her mother?

JASON:  Well, in the sequels, we find out that she doesn’t really like her mother’s iron grip on her life and that she just wants to be free to marry for love, not money. So that could be her motive.

ME:  Perfect! Now we need to figure out the motives for all the rest of the characters (not including the animals).

JASON:  Okay. Drizella, the eldest daughter, could have done it because she wants to inherit the family fortune sooner rather than later after her mother dies naturally.

Drizella

ME:  (Nodding) Good. Go on.

JASON:  Who else is there?

ME:  How about the dress shopkeeper? That’s where the murder takes place. Wouldn’t she naturally be a suspect?

JASON:  I guess, but what would her motive be?

ME:  I know. She could have done it because Lady Tremaine hasn’t been paying her bills on time and the woman is about to lose her shop.

JASON:  Hmm . . . that will do.

Finally, we needed to come up with the right detective to ferret out all the clues, with the help of Cinderella and the Prince, of course. Thinking back on the movie, that left only one possibility. It was apparent to me, but I had to bring Jason around to the realization.

ME:  Okay, Jason, who was the one in the film who went all over the countryside asking questions?

JASON:  Huh?

ME:  You know, he had a glass slipper and . . .

JASON:  Oh, you mean the Grand Duke?

grand duke 2

ME:  Exactly. Even though he’s kind of a bumbling fool, he’s the perfect type to put people off their guard while secretly he’s observing their behavior and asking all kinds of innocent questions.

JASON:  You mean his clumsiness is just an act?

ME:  Precisely. Now all we have to do is sit down and plot it out.

Et voilá. An Agatha Christie-styled murder mystery. Anyone want to write it? (We won’t for fear of being sued by Disney. Although perhaps Jason might give it a go as a piece of fan fiction. I’ll let you know if he does, but I can’t promise to post it here. He keeps his fan fiction private.)

In any case, it was a fun exercise and took a good bit longer in the car than it took you to read about it here. By the way, Jason helped create this post, so give him half the credit, okay?

Originally posted 2013-08-23 06:00:17.

“Monday Mystery” – À la Christie

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Agatha Christie

Long considered the maven of murder, Dame Agatha Christie had a certain formula she followed in the beginning of her career as a mystery novelist. I know because I recently watched a PBS show about her in the series “Extraordinary Women” (see the YouTube clip below) and then followed up by checking a few websites dedicated to her work, including this one.

First came the murder itself. She would begin by determining the method, victim and perpetrator. Having worked as a nurse during WWI, she had become very familiar with toxic substances and so poison was a particular favorite of hers when it came to method.

After visualizing and jotting down the essentials of the crime, she would turn her attention to the perpetrator’s true motive. She felt that it needed to be such a transparent motive that the reader would easily cast it aside as “too obvious.”

Next, she developed the rest of the cast of suspects, never too large and their lives often interwoven in unusual ways. Each was assigned a plausible motive in order to further confuse the reader, as well as secrets they were hiding about themselves.

Finally, she’d outline a plot that included necessary clues and red herrings (though not so many as to overly complicate the story). Stir in the right detective to ferret out the truth, such as Hercule Poirot in her first book, THE MYSTERIOUS AFFAIR AT STYLES, and voila! A compelling page-turner of a mystery is born.

Mysterious_affair_at_stylesSo why am I reviewing Dame Christie’s method here? Because I want you all to understand that we put it to the test during my recent road trip to Utah. By “we,” I mean my son, Jason, and I. After all, there wasn’t a whole lot to talk about during our 10-hour drive south to Salt Lake City so we decided to make up a mystery à la Christie.

We only talked it through but if you check back here on Friday, we’ll share what we came up with.

Originally posted 2013-08-19 06:00:43.

“Monday Mystery” – COLD PURSUIT

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Released just last month, Susan Dayley’s new interactive thriller is available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble in its ebook version. The reader gets to choose how they want the story to continue in this version and it’s on sale right now for $2.99. There is also a paperback version for more traditional readers.

ColdPursuitCoverHere’s a quick look:

Synopsis

The first time Kennady meets Atticus she is not impressed. The second time she is offended. But before the week is over, they team up to find out who sabotaged the secret alternative-energy device in the lab on the university campus. Filled with mystery suspense and romance, Cold Pursuit takes your reading experience to the next level.
This is an interactive book in the eBook format: there are links to music videos, recipes, clues, pictures etc. PLUS the story offers the reader the opportunity to choose how they want the story to go, with the possibility of 4 different endings!
Excerpt*

Kennady noticed the storm had stopped. The light from the street lamps created pink circles on the snow beneath them. The night had become dark, and tombstones were difficult to discern more than twenty feet away. Heavy trees overhead blocked any light that might have filtered through the clouds.

Neither Kennady nor Atticus spoke as they rounded the back of the chapel, moving through the deeper shadows cast by the stone building with its gothic-arched, stained-glass windows. Nobody was there.

“Grady?” Kennady called softly. “Where are you?” She swung the flashlight’s beam around her.

“Put the coil on the ground,” the now familiar voice called from her left.

She spun in that direction. Across the road, Grady stepped out from behind a large oak tree.

“So, you know who I am,” he said.

“Where’s my dog?” Kennady demanded, shining the light on his face.

“Show me the coil.”

. . .

Just as he made a move toward her, a figure rushed him from the shadows. It was Atticus. He leaped, tackling Grady at the waist and dragging him to the snow.

Kennady screamed. The two men struggled on the ground, rolling in the snow among the graves. . .

And then everything stopped. Atticus and Grady had rolled against a large granite tombstone, and a man’s head lay against the base as if a blow had knocked him out. He lay as still as the bones six feet beneath him. A dark stain spread in the snow. The top man rose and faced Kennady.

It was Grady. “Give me the coil or I’ll do the same to you,” he growled.

*The antagonist’s name was changed to prevent this from being a spoiler.

Author
Susan Dayley is the author of Redemption, a couple of stories that have appeared in anthologies, and numerous articles. She tutors in the mornings, attends classes at the local university, and loves to write. She recently had a party to launch COLD PURSUIT and pictures can be seen on her blog.
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Originally posted 2013-08-12 06:00:47.

“Monday Mystery” – A DASH OF MADNESS: A THRILLER ANTHOLOGY

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Since this is an anthology, I’m forgoing the usual bios (because there would be too many), but this exciting collection of short thrillers was published by Xchyler Publishing and is available on Amazon both in paperback and e-book. Reviews can be read (and added) on Goodreads.

ADashOfMadness_Cover(That bloodshot eye is pretty gruesome, isn’t it?)

Here’s a quick look at the stories:

Synopsis

One man’s crazy is another man’s norm.

Eight bizarre stories explore twisted perceptions and challenge conceptions about right and wrong. With a fascinating dive into several unstable minds, the authors examine different avenues for exposing warped cognition and mutilated logic. Each delivers a disquieting glimpse of reality.

Reformation by M. Irish Gardner: With a fresh start in life, the last thing freed inmate Todd Jefferson wants to do is live someone else’s, until the pros outweigh the cons.

Mouse and Cat by Elizabeth Gilliland: Mouse knows his place: among the filth and remnants of mankind. When given a chance to change his fate, his choice reflects more than just the intentions of his heart.

Stunner by Sarah Hunter Hyatt: As a stranger in a new town, Marin Overstreet is forced to confront a past she didn’t know existed, and defeat the man sent to silence her forever.

Five Humvees by Breck LeSueur: Three lives, three errs in judgment. Countless consequences reside within this twisted military thriller.

Morningside by F.M. Longo: Back on duty, Detective Morningside must defy the odds and solve the impossible by delving into the criminal mind.

Kissed a Snake by Ben Ireland: Abandoned as a child, Jason only wants to understand his father’s reasons. And to kill him for it. However, learning the truth leads to anything but satisfaction.

Fogo by David MacIver: A neighborhood arson, a broken home, and an overactive imagination are the least of Renata’s worries, especially when her dreams creep into her real life.

Proxy by Tim Andrew: For Bret Maher, death is a perk on the job. But when he takes on a new contract with guaranteed success, he may get more than he bargained for.

Excerpt from “Reformation”

Rita picked up his plate a little later, and Todd continued to sit and think. His prison years had flown by. He hardly remembered a thing, but the biggest motivator he’d always kept as his focus, as his flotation device in a sea of hard reality, was his brother. Shawn. A man that seemed to have forgotten him.

Author and Editor

McKenna Gardner (aka M. Irish Gardner) earned her Bachelor of Science in 2003 from Brigham Young University – Idaho, where she first began writing and editing, and her love of classic literature blossomed. Previously a marketing director and 8th/9th grade educator, McKenna finds her position at Xchyler the winning combination of a career she enjoys and her greatest passion, her children.

McKenna

Originally posted 2013-07-29 11:39:29.

“Monday Mystery” – Mysteries, Suspense Novels, and Thrillers Are Like Driveways

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This past week, we had our driveway torn up because of cracking and appearance issues.

photo 3 of driveway

We discovered, in the process, that the pipe for the sprinkler system had been placed just under the concrete surface where it was likely to bear the most weight and wear down.

photo 2 of drivewayphoto 1 of drivewaySo before the new driveway can be poured, a trench needs to be dug and a new pipe fitted to lie more deeply under the ground.

Brian, the guy doing our new driveway, explained that you’ve really got to watch out for builders cutting corners and getting away with it simply because it’s out of view. As he put it, “They come in here ready to pour concrete and they don’t care what’s already there. They’re just going to cover it up.”

Writers can’t be like that. We may be ready to pour out a whole novel’s worth of words, but we’ve got to make sure we’ve laid the proper foundation first. Why? Because our readers will hold us accountable. Particularly when it comes to mysteries, suspense, and thrillers. We have to place certain clues in the right places and in the right ways (there, but not too obvious) and we also have to be sure and include red herrings to keep things complicated enough. After all, our readers are going to be tearing up our “driveways” as they devour our stories and there had better not be any unacceptable surprises.

What kind of driveways are we constructing in the first place? Asphalt? Concrete? One made out of block pavers? It’s pretty easy to tell the difference between all three.

But where do you draw the line in terms of genre between mystery, suspense novel, and thriller?

Author and former literary agent Nathan Bransford came up with these distinctions:

  • Thrillers have action
  • Suspense has danger, but not necessarily action
  • Mysteries have mysteries (something you don’t know until the end)

Still confused? I am. After all, I think THE BOURNE IDENTITY and THE DA VINCI CODE has all three elements.

Another agent, Jessica Faust, says there are three different kinds of mysteries: the cozy (usually involving an amateur sleuth and not too many bloody bodies), the mystery (grittier and darker…definitely more blood), and the suspense/thriller (the darkest of the three…more about stopping a killer than solving a crime). Check out her explanation here.

There’s a fascinating post by novelist Janet L. Smith describing the conclusions of suspense master, Alfred Hitchcock:

  • Suspense has no relationship to fear
  • It’s the state of waiting for something to happen
  • Therefore, the viewer or reader must be informed of an awful, impending event in order to be held in suspense, rather than merely surprised when it happens

Smith points out that a mystery, on the other hand, “is a novel of revelation, with action more mental than physical.” In this case, the audience is not kept informed.

And here’s one final analysis by Maeve Maddox.

Let’s say Mystery is Asphalt, Suspense is Concrete, and Thrillers are those driveways built with block pavers. What kind of driveway do you specialize in, and why? Please let me know in a comment below. I’m interested to find out which is most popular these days.

 

Originally posted 2013-07-22 17:40:31.

“Monday Mystery” – MOTIVE FOR MURDER

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I’m starting something new here involving suspense.

Beginning today, my Monday postings will be about mysteries, thrillers, and suspense novels.

The postings will be either reviews of suspense novels that I choose (no requests, please), musings about the mystery, suspense, and thriller genres in general, or announcements of new releases. (Here, I will welcome requests from authors . . . If you’ve got a new mystery, thriller, or suspense novel coming out, just send me a basic synopsis, a short excerpt of around 100 words or less, and a brief bio, along with a cover image and your author photo.)

Some of you may recall that I had originally set aside Mondays for various things attached to the acronym MOLESKIN–one of my favorite writing product lines. But it became too complicated to keep track of . . . hence, the change.

I’m kicking it off this week with an announcement of a new release: Marlene Bateman’s MOTIVE FOR MURDER: An Erica Coleman Mystery. Published only last month, it’s available on Amazon and at all LDS bookstores, including Deseret Book and Seagull.

A Motive for Murder_High resolution

Here’s a quick look:

Synopsis

Meet Erica Coleman—a gifted and quirky private investigator with an OCD-like passion for neatness and symmetry, a penchant for cooking, (ten terrific recipes are included), and a weakness for chocolate.

Erica imagined that her trip to Florida would be a slice of heaven—a chance to get away from it all and catch up with her best friend, Wendy. But one day into her vacation, all hope of fun in the sun is dashed when she stumbles, literally, over a dead man on Wendy’s driveway. With police closing in on her friend as their main suspect, Erica must find the real killer before Wendy ends up behind bars.

With Erica’s skill, solving the mystery should be a piece of cake but then a second homicide attempt hits close to home and generates a whole new list of suspects. There’s no way to sugarcoat it. A murderer is on the prowl, and no one is above suspicion.

As the plot thickens, it appears Erica may have bitten off more than she can chew, but she forges on, sifting through mounting evidence until she hones in on the killer who has a surprising motive for murder. With a dash of romance and some surprising twists, this thrilling mystery will keep you on the edge of your seat until the very last page.

 

Excerpt

“As she drove back to Wendy’s house, the headlights cleaved the darkness and shone through the rain, which was falling harder now. Erica parked across the street and was nearly to Wendy’s door when she stopped suddenly, catching herself as she nearly fell over something.

It was the still figure of a man lying face down on the driveway. He was strangely unmoving. The light from the porch illuminated a puddle alongside him, which was growing bigger by the second. A chill shivered down Erica’s spine as she noticed that the puddle was streaked by dark red threads that ran and merged with rivulets of rain.”

 

Author

Marlene Bateman Sullivan was born in Salt Lake City, Utah.  She graduated from the University of Utah with a BA in English. She is married to Kelly R. Sullivan and they are the parents of seven children.

MarleneBateman_238x287

Her hobbies are gardening, camping, and reading.  Marlene has been published extensively in magazines and newspapers and has written a number of non-fiction books, including:  Latter-day Saint Heroes and Heroines, And There Were Angels Among Them, Visit’s From Beyond the Veil, By the Ministering of Angels, and Brigham’s Boys. Marlene also wrote the best-selling novel, Light on Fire Island.

A busy writer, Marlene is set to have three books published this year. Gaze Into Heaven, a fascinating collection of over 50 documented near-death experiences in early church history, was published earlier this year. Now we have Motive for Murder, the first in a mystery series featuring the quirky Erica Coleman. Later in July, Heroes of Faith, a collection of stories about people who risked their life for the gospel, will be released by Cedar Fort Inc. You can learn more about Marlene at her website.

Originally posted 2013-07-15 06:00:53.

Special Deal on Mystery E-books

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For those of you who have read my interviews with French authors published by Le French Book, you might want to grab up their terrific titles today while they’re still being offered on Kindle for just ninety-nine cents! The offer ends at midnight.

Here’s the link to buy.

This is a great deal for great books by great authors, including one I haven’t yet interviewed: David Khara, who wrote THE BLEIBERG PROJECT (A CONSORTIUM THRILLER), winner of the Blue Moon Award for Best Thriller.

The Bleiberg Project

Here’s the blurb from Amazon:

An adrenaline-packed ride to save the world from a horrific conspiracy straight out of the darkest hours of history. 

Are Hitler’s atrocities really over? For depressive Wall Street trader Jeremy Corbin, absolute truths become undeniable lies overnight. He finds out his long-lost father is dead, he discovers his boss’s real identity, and he ends up boarding a plane to Zurich. He has a Nazi medallion in his pocket, a hot CIA bodyguard next to him, and a clearly dangerous Mossad agent on his tail. What was his father investigating? Why was his mother assassinated? Why are unknown sides fighting over him with automatic weapons? Can the conspiracy be stopped? This fast-paced thriller full of humor and humanity was an instant sensation in France. Think a dash of Robin Cook, a splash of John Grisham, and pinch of Clive Cussler with a very distinctive voice all it’s own.

Originally posted 2013-06-21 11:27:40.

“Thriller Thursdays” – Suspense of “The Bourne Identity” More Complex

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Present word count of WIP:  60,234 (Yes, I’ve been dead in the water when it comes to writing…somewhat like Ludlum’s protagonist in the beginning.)

Between the Olympics, gearing up for a book launch and being held in suspense over the final cover of my next novel, it was all I could do to get my reading in, but I did! I actually finished Robert Ludlum’s classic spy thriller, “The Bourne Identity” last Thursday…at about 11:27 pm. Too late to blog about it.

But it gave me time to watch the two movies based on the story. You see, I had thought I’d read this before, but I didn’t remember half of the plot in the book, mainly due to the more recent film version with Matt Damon. The film with Damon was so terrific that it effectively supplanted the plot of the novel in my mind.

Confused, I did a little investigating and came to discover there was a film version put out for television back in the 80’s starring Richard Chamberlain and Jaclyn Smith. While it was much truer to the book, I didn’t enjoy it nearly as much…and it wasn’t just because of the acting (Jaclyn Smith made me cringe).

 Is that a reflection on Ludlum’s novel? I think so, yes. While his plot is more complex and the writing is tightly-paced (I’ve never seen so many sentence fragments), I began to grow tired of the hero’s struggles to regain his memory. The book was very tied in to current headlines and, having lived through the 80’s, I remember the terrorist/assassin named “Carlos” and how the newspapers bandied about his name every time there was some high-profile attack.

(Spoiler Alert): While the book makes Jason Bourne struggle to come to terms with the possibility that he is this “Carlos,” it eventually clarifies that he isn’t, that he was a good guy working for the U.S. all along, not killing but faking kills in order to draw out the competitive Carlos. While Ludlum writes short sentences, he writes an awful lot of them and, at a certain point, the material just seemed too dense, the psychological struggling too repetitive.

I found the approach taken by Tony Gilroy in the Matt Damon film to be much more compelling: There was no Carlos, or if so, then Jason Bourne (and others like him) filled that role. Bourne was, indeed, a bad guy who did bad things (even if he was brainwashed to do them) and, once he realizes it, he has to find a way to live with himself and try to change his life.

I’m giving it 3.5 stars.

Favorite quote:

“Nothing makes a man more nationalistic than to think his country’s owned by foreigners. He can adjust in time to losing a war–that only means the enemy was stronger–but to lose his economy means the enemy was smarter.”

Next up: Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood…and from what I’ve read so far, I think this will be a 5-star read!

And stay tuned tomorrow. I believe I’ll be unveiling my cover!

Originally posted 2012-08-16 15:21:49.

“Thriller Thursdays” – Sick Suspense of “Kiss the Girls”

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Present word count of WIP:  58,116

Sick Suspense. Those are the words that come to mind in describing this psychological thriller by James Patterson.

According to the Oakland Press:

“Move over Thomas Harris, along comes James Patterson. Before you settle into Patterson’s latest book, make sure you’ve got a couple free nights of reading time. It’s the sort of grisly tale that keeps your hands gripping the book and your heart pounding at any unusual noise in the house.”

I beg to differ on two points:

1) Patterson doesn’t hold a candle to Harris.

2) My hands didn’t grip the book nor did my heart pound in fear.

Patterson is not nearly as literary as Harris. He may try to make up for his average writing style with extra graphic descriptions, but that only served to make me feel sick. I almost gave up on the book twice. The only reason I skimmed ahead was to see if my hunch about one of the perpetrators, Casanova, was correct. It wasn’t, so at least he kept me guessing, but the surprise at the end kind of came out of left field. Not so satisfying.

Morgan Freeman as Alex Cross in the movie version

I know many are enamored with his main character, Alex Cross, an African-American detective and psychologist, but I thought the character of Kate McTiernan, the victim that manages to escape more than once, much more intriguing. This is the third book in a row by a male author on this list in which the female main character is as strong, if not stronger, than the male. I’m beginning to wonder if that’s a given in successful suspense.

Ashley Judd as Dr. Kate McTiernan

The only thing I really liked about this book?

His first line:

“For three weeks, the young killer actually lived inside the walls of an extraordinary fifteen-room beach house.”

Now, that’s spooky. That conjured up all kinds of scenarios in my head.

Do you think suspense novels are best when they describe everything in graphic detail, or leave that kind of stuff to your imagination?

 

Originally posted 2012-07-26 06:00:53.

“Thriller Thursdays” – Slow Suspense of That Tattooed Girl

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Present word count of WIP:  57,034

Stieg Larsson’s original version of the suspense novel, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, was to have been titled Men Who Hate Women (in Swedish, of course). And that may be all you need to know in order to look beyond the plot in this story for a theme.

While it has been praised all over the world and even won several awards, I have to say I was disappointed. After having just read The Silence of the Lambs, so tightly written with the type of spare and sometimes poetic prose I love, Larrson’s book felt dense and cumbersome. And I was confused about the quoted statistics regarding violence against women which began each new section…until I discovered his original title. This is definitely a book that is not nice to women, but fortunately an unlikely heroine arises to defend her gender.

Of course, this novel was edited and translated after Larsson died, so who knows how closely it hues to his original vision. It would have been interesting to see how the book might have fared had it been published before the author’s death.

For me, the main problem was that he had a terrific family saga mystery wrapped in the distant world of Swedish high finance. And that’s an Achilles heel for me. Anytime I start reading or hearing about economics, business, and numbers, my eyes glaze over and my brain tends to want to shut off. I would have enjoyed the book a lot more had he minimized the corporate world stuff and amped up the personal family story. (By “amping” I mean increasing the pacing.)

The opening Prologue was terrific because it honed in on the central mystery, intriguing the reader without giving away much. But then the story veered off into the corporate stuff in order to introduce the finance reporter who ends up tasked with solving the family mystery. My interest didn’t pick up again until about 30 pages in when the tattooed girl, Lisbeth Salander, is finally introduced.

Any time she was in a scene I was hooked. Any time she wasn’t, I found myself missing her. She’s that strong of a character. (I wasn’t surprised to learn later in the book that she’s likely on the autism spectrum.) The reporter was really quite bland in comparison and yet he appears to be the protagonist, since he takes up most of the book. Once they’re teamed to solve the mystery of the missing/dead girl (which only happens about two thirds of the way through the book), the pace finally begins to pick up.

Then, after the mystery’s solved, Larsson brings back the corporate stuff so the reporter can get his revenge on the corrupt financier who had sued him in the first place…but it takes away from the power that was in essence returned to women in the conclusion of the mystery.

In sum, I don’t understand why this was the huge hit that it was. The novel was too drawn-out and disjointed for my taste, not to mention it had some offensive scenes I skipped over. I’m giving it three stars.

Still, there were some quotes I liked:

“Normally seven minutes of another person’s company was enough to give her a headache so she set things up to live as a recluse. She was perfectly content as long as people left her in peace. Unfortunately society was not very smart or understanding.”

“Everyone has secrets. It’s just a matter of finding out what they are.”

“Friendship – my definition – is built on two things. Respect and trust. Both elements have to be there. And it has to be mutual. You can have respect for someone, but if you don’t have trust, the friendship will crumble.”

If you’ve read The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, I’d love to hear what you thought. Did it hold your interest the whole way? Who was the real protagonist?

Next on my list: James Patterson’s Kiss the Girls . . . I’m expecting a fast read, so I’ll be reviewing it next Thursday.

 

Originally posted 2012-07-19 11:34:58.