Copyright 2013 by Splendide Mendax, Inc and Preston Child. Published by Vision, New York.
I really liked the first 80% of this book. Then it got ridiculous.
This is the 13th book in the Preston & Child series featuring Aloysius Pendergast, a rather effete FBI agent. My wife loves these books and I can see why. They are easy to read, the story was compelling and Pendergast is one interesting guy. But I like my stories to be somewhat realistic. This one has, as a key plot element, a very detailed reverie by Pendergast where he transports himself back more than 100 years to overhear a conversation between Oscar Wilde and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Yeah.
Up until that point the plot was interesting. Corrie Swanson, a student at John Jay and an aspiring FBI agent and acolyte of Pendergast’s, chooses a thesis topic that takes her to Roaring Fork CO, a ski playground of the rich and famous. The topic of her thesis was a forensic analysis of the bones of 12 miners who were killed, ostensibly by a grizzly bear, in the summer of 1876. She soon discovers that they were likely victims of a serial murderer. But things spiral out of control for both her and the town while she is there. A series of murder/arsons and a guy shooting at her car, plus a second crazy who stalks her. Not a typical ski vacation.
Besides the self-seance, I have a few other objections to the plot. Both Pendergast and Swanson commit B&Es and Swanson also steals a snowmobile and some items from a museum. A few bones, too. Not exactly exemplary behavior from law enforcement professionals.
Then, as the end of the book, Swanson goes out in a snowstorm, against Pendergast’s advice and is attacked by not one but two criminals and is saved by another woman who is tailing one of the culprits. Pendergast shows up, too. That is 5 people out in a raging snowstorm. On Christmas Eve. And, while being pursued by two men bent on murdering her, Swanson discovers the remains of the 1876 murderer and collects bone samples. I suppose I should be impressed at her desire to put a bow on her thesis while being shot at, but it was a bit much for me.
5 out of 10. But there is enough here that I will try another in the series. Maybe one of the early ones – Jett says they are better.
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