Mystery Mondays: Review: 7th Heaven

Title: 7th Heaven
Author: James Patterson (with Maxine Paetro)
Genre: Fiction, Mystery, Suspense
Pub Date: Feb. 2008 (this ed: Apr. 2009), Grand Central Publishing
Trade Paperback, 376 pages

Synopsis

Two cases have pushed San Francisco detective Lindsay Boxer beyond her limits. In the first, a terrible fire in a wealthy home has left a married couple dead and Lindsay and her partner, Rich Conklin, searching for clues. At the same time, Michael Campion, the son of California's ex-governor with a reputation for partying, has been missing for a month. When there finally seems to be a lead in his case, it is a devastating one. And the combined pressure from the press and the brass is overwhelming.

Assistant District Attorney Yuki Castellano plunges into the biggest case of her life to get to the bottom of Michael Campion's disappearance. As fire after fire consumes couples in expensive neighborhoods, Lindsay and her friends in the Women's Murder Club race to find the arsonists responsible. But suddenly the fires are raging too close to home. Frightened for her life and torn between two men, Lindsay confronts the most daunting dilemmas she's ever faced — in a thriller with unexpected twists and emotional extremes of the kind only James Patterson — "the man who can't miss" (Time) — can deliver.

My Thoughts

It has been awhile since I read any of the Women's Murder Club (I'm hereby referring to it as WMC) books by James Patterson. I was waiting for this 7th book to come out in paperback, and even though it's been sitting on my shelves for awhile, I only recently got around to reading it. Don't ask me why, because as I always find out when I start one of Patterson's WMC books, I can't put them down!

While he may not be a literary genius, I do find Patterson's books to be enjoyable, not to mention very easy, to read. Short chapters can do wonders for a book, especially when one is busy and often interrupted from reading. (Because as much as I didn't want to put this book down, there were times I had to.) Another big reason I like this series of books in particular is that we get to know a set of characters and revisit them over and over and see what is new in their lives. I think that adds to the appeal of the WMC books.

One of Patterson's strengths is his ability to weave together separate mysteries and crimes and yet still tie it all together into the story. For me, that really helps with the pacing of the story and keeps me turning the pages--you get a fresh look into one of the crimes every few chapters. With 7th Heaven, one of the side plots did bug me a little bit, and that was the problems that Yuki had when trying to date true crime writer Jason Twilly turned creepy. Initially it just didn't seem to fit, though by the end of the book it did make more sense in relation to the story. In my opnion, this little piece of the puzzle just felt almost as if it had been added in after the fact. Other than that, I really thought the ending was well-done, and I honestly didn't see it coming. I'd say more but I'm afraid of giving too much away to those of you who haven't read this book.

If you like mysteries and suspense/thrillers, I think you would enjoy Patterson's Women's Murder Club books. It's not absolutely necessary to read them in order, but I do think it's preferable to do that so that you can see the main characters develop.

My rating:



Other reviews of 7th Heaven:

My Random Acts of Reading ~ Jenn's Bookshelf

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