Copyright 2013 by Gunner Publications LLC. Published by Grand Central Publishing, New York.
I think Jeffery Deaver is a very talented author. Some of his plots – particularly the ones involving Lincoln Rhyme – are among the most complex and deviant ones I have encountered. I was really looking forward to reading The October List.
But I couldn’t finish it.
This is a book written in reverse – last chapter first, first chapter last. Even the title page and credits are at the back of the book. Why? All I can posit is that Deaver got bored writing in the conventional first-chapter-first style and decided to shake things up. But the result is that there is no groundwork laid. The reader is forced to jump into a plot involving a bunch of characters that have not been properly introduced and into a plot rife with mysterious references to events that have already occurred – but haven’t yet appeared in the book.
I was tempted to start at the back and read the chapters in numerical order, but that seemed like cheating. But to do it the way Deaver wanted me to do it was too much work.
I have set it aside. Maybe I will go back to it, maybe I won’t.
Incomplete.