Pop! Goes the Weasel

by James Patterson

Ebook, 1999

Library's rating

Library's review

There's not much to say about this book, except that it illustrates all the flaws of reading a book series for me. Series that feature compelling, interesting characters are a joy, giving the reader a chance to spend more time in the company of people they enjoy. Then there's this one ...

This is

the fifth (of 18! So far!) Alex Cross mystery/thrillers, featuring a Washington, D.C., police detective/psychologist who catches bad guys by getting into their head. The books are already starting to blur together for me. In every book, Cross contemplates leaving the police force altogether and going back into private practice as a psychologist. In every book, there's some amazingly beautiful and intelligent woman whom he instantly falls in love with, and all the reader can think is, "Uh-oh." Because that never turns out well for Alex. He's like a cross between Job and Eeyore, this guy.

Every killer is the worst yet, the most heinous, the most clever and devious, the most dangerous to Cross and his preternaturally perfect children and wise old grandmother. Sometimes the killers get caught at the end of the book, and as a reader I enjoy that closure. Sometimes they don't, and I just know I'm going to have to sit through another book somewhere down the line featuring this same tired storyline without even the juice of new characters to liven it up. And yet I can't stop reading them, so really, who's the fool?

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Description

Fiction. Mystery. Suspense. Thriller. HTML: In this heart-stopping thriller, Detective Alex Cross and his beloved fiancé find themselves tangled in a complex murder investigation, threatening not only public safety, but their chance at happiness together. Alex Cross is happy, but his happiness is threatened by a series of chilling murders�??murders with a pattern so twisted, it leaves investigators reeling. Cross's ingenious pursuit of the killer produces a suspect: a British diplomat named Geoffrey Shafer. But proving that Shafer is the murderer becomes a potentially deadly task. As the diplomat engages in a brilliant series of surprising countermoves, in and out of the courtroom, Alex and his fiancée become hopelessly entangled with the most memorable nemesis Alex Cross has ever faced. Pop Goes the Weasel reveals James Patterson at the peak of his power. Here is a chilling villain no reader will forget, a love story of great tenderness, and a plot of relentless suspense and heart-pounding pace. To read Pop Goes the Weasel is to discover why James Patterson is one of the world's greatest suspense writer… (more)