Review special: Thrillers

Three James Patterson thrillers in about a month sounds like a good deal for avid fans, but they should be wary of just who is writing the books.

The latest Alex Cross book Cross Fire (Random House, $38.99, pbk) is certainly written by Patterson. Until the last couple of pages, the words and deeds flow like the Patterson of old.

Don't Blink (Random House, $38.99, pbk) is written in collaboration with Howard Roughan and although not in the style of the Alex Cross books, a reader will notice a similarity with the way Patterson writes. But it is clear that the prolific author is becoming more like a writing factory than a writer of thrillers.

Postcard Killers (Random House, $38.99, pbk), written with Liza Marklund, is so far removed from anything resembling Patterson that fans would be best advised to stay away.

All three books have short chapters, big print, and half-empty pages if the end of the chapter coincides with the start of a page. However, the difference between the books is so marked you have to ask does Patterson realise he is damaging his image? If he does, does he care?

Sure, the money will be rolling in but when does enough become enough for the author? Being more charitable, Patterson could be providing an outlet for aspiring thriller writers, but at what cost?

Postcard Killers is just plain silly. Two beautiful and rich killers roam Europe arranging their victims in the art style of an "Old Master".

United States detective Jacob Kanon is tracking the killers, motivated by the deaths of his daughter and her partner who were murdered by these killers. He teams up with a Swedish journalist who received a postcard from Stockholm indicating the next victims. Getting to the end of the book was difficult and the ending was disappointing.

Don't Blink was far more gruesome and flowed far better, but again the writing varied from good to ordinary. Having someone take out a mafia boss by cutting out his eyes with a scalpel in an Italian restaurant quickly gets your attention.

Seated at a nearby table, reporter Nick Daniels is conducting a once-in-a-lifetime interview with a legendary baseball bad-boy. Shocked and shaken, he does not realise that he has accidentally captured a key piece of evidence.

There is some political intrigue in the motive for the murder. Unfortunately, the reporter starts talking directly to the reader in a first-person way that gets irritating. The book is easy to read and the brain will not be taxed.

Cross Fire was read on a plane and proved to be a good choice. Although the plot is always well telegraphed, there is good interaction by Alex Cross (who has always seemed to have such bad luck with women in his life) and the villain Kyle Craig, who undertakes plastic surgery to look like FBI agent Max Siegel.

The surgery allows Craig to get so close to Cross they end up working on the same case. Cross put Craig in prison years ago but somehow, and readers are not told how, he escaped from solitary confinement with the aim of killing Cross, his wife-to-be and extended family.

The book sails along nicely until a few pages from the end. Wrapping up the story is done in a rush. The actual end is Patterson at his imaginative best. Getting there was fanciful.

The three books have hurried and clumsy endings in common. It seems that the formula is writing to a page number, then working out what to do about killing off the predetermined number of bad people. At nearly $40 a book, readers deserve better.

• Dene Mackenzie is a Dunedin writer.

 

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