Brian H

Overall, I liked the book.  I liked the way the author shifted back and forth in time to develop the story.  The story was somewhat predictable but there were a couple of twists near the end.  Even though I liked the book, I didn’t really cheer for the characters, they were too rich and privileged.

I liked this novella. It was my first read of Gillian Flynn. I don’t ordinarily like any horror but found this short 40 pages suspenseful with unexpected twists for such a short story. 

This book definitely has a horror element to it.  It starts slow as it develops three different characters that are seemingly unrelated.  It speeds up as the stories intertwined but I think the story is unnecessarily gory/ gruesome in description.  Despite my dislike for this, I liked the overall story.

Overall, I liked the book.  Easy to cheer for the main character despite her infidelity.  I liked that she eventually confessed to her husband and they worked to resolve her problem.  My biggest beef is that the fight with the big bad brute sent to kill her was not realistic.  Would have been better if husband or Private Investigator friend came to her rescue.

Overall, I liked the book.  I liked that it got right into the action.  The book was basically revenge based where the main character created his “terminal list” of those he had to kill for killing his Seal team, family, and friends.  The action carried through the whole book.  I found it was weak in character descriptions for some of the characters on the list, the details of why they were included on the List.    Could have reduced some unnecessary details also.  I do plan to read subsequent books in the series, this was his first novel and have heard the author has improved in subsequent ones.

I really like Hurwitz but I did not enjoy this book anywhere near as much as his others.  The story seemed very slow developing the characters.  Once into the action, it held my interest.  However, the  story that a 30 something nurse, not particularly in shape, and injured could outrun, outlast and outsmart an international jungle terrorist was too far fetched for me.  

I really enjoyed this book (listened on audio).  While it was easy to figure out who the villain was, it really held my interest waiting and wanting the main character to figure it out.  I liked the flow of the story in that she described why key people behaved the way they did after the main event with only hints in the main body.  I plan to read more of her books.

Another solid thriller from Taylor.  He brings back a nemesis from the past in “the Ghost”.  The plot had the terrorists developing multiple attacks in multiple countries with diversions.  As always, lots of action particularly for the second half of the book.  I liked that the details of the planned attacks were vague as it keep me more interested until the real action started.  I also liked that that while the main character, Pike Logan is a hardass, he also cares about his team.  

Overall, I thought the story was decent.  The story held my interest and had a good lead-in to the next book in the series.  However, for the described potential of the Omnimetal, the story seemed unrealistically “local”.  A couple relatively small companies fighting for mineral rights where something with so much financial and military value would be universally fought for.  The characters were well described and defined, but they were not all a necessity in the story and distracted me.  I would have liked to have the action scenes to be longer.  It was like this nice lead up and then, “bam”, it was over.  I am not sure I will continue with the series but I just might to find out if and how the story goes national and/or global.

Thought it was a good story.  Straight forward, no real surprises.  Charley Stevens and Kathy Frost were the main characters, Mike Bowditch was not part of the story.  Charley was still a warden and Kathy was very early in her career so this should be much lower than #15.5 in the series.  Worth the read.

The book held my interest, not sure if the main character would live or die, whether his wife would leave him, whether his family would survive, or whether he would stick with the life of crime.  So, while I liked the book, I am conflicted at the end of the book whether I liked the main character with all his criminal activities.

This was my first book by Grippando.  I thoroughly enjoyed it.  The story line was very interesting involving stock market manipulation and algorithms that made many individuals and banks rich beyond belief.  It was a good, believable story what they might do when threatened to lose their golden goose egg.  I also liked that one of the bad guys was a surprise.  I plan to read more of his books.