16TH SEDUCTION

I am on a thriller reading spree and I spotted this on the top of the NYTimes Bestseller list .Now let me be forthright and say that I am not a James Patterson fan but I picked this one up to see if I could join the fan league.Turns out,some people never learn.

Plot:

This is the 16th book in the Women's Murder Club series.Detective Lindsay Boxer and her husband Joe are fighting to save their marriage when a bomb goes off in downtown San Fransisco killing twenty five people.As if this werent enough,the man she and Joe arrest as the bomber denies the allegations and turns the tables on Lindsay ,demanding she be put on trial.

There is also a parallel story running along in which a wave of mysterious and unnatural heart atttacks claim seemingly unrelated victims across town.

Lindsay must connect the dots and race against time in both the investigations to expose the real culprit and also save herself.

My Views:

This book certainly didnt manage to turn me into a fan.But before I go on and say what I didnt like about it let me begin on a positive note.The chapters are delightfully short,just the way I like them.So I finished reading this book in a few hours.I found it a tad boring at the start but I persisted because I wanted to see where it was going.I must admit ,it got a bit dramatic during the Bombers trial and I began reading it at a fantastic speed thinking at the time that I might have been a bit hasty in writing it off but the plot just fizzled and the interest and intensity plummeted in the latter half.The ending felt flat and I wasnt happy at all with the way it was resolved.Everything seemed made up for extra effect.These seemed like larger than life characters.

Moreover the parallel story was not eased into the main plot but felt hastily pushed when it was least expected and needed just to build the tempo because of a weak main plot.The serial killer story was just ridiculous because it is hard to imagine a mental patient locked up for 40 years can be so ingenious.The idea that he goes out at night through secret subterranean tunnels to commit murders was too far fetched.

I didnt really like any of the characters either but maybe it was the after effect of reading something so predictable or because I didnt have a background about their lives.I have no idea about the other books in the series so its possible that the characters have evolved .This can be read as a stand alone novel if you just have a few hours and want a breezy read.

I rate it a 2 and a half out of 5.