Another Excellent Entry in the Series

books:


	• Obsession: An Alex Delaware Novel (Alex Delaware Novels) Jonathan Kellerman Ballantine Books, 2008 - 464 pages average customer review:based on 80 reviews view larger image
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Amusing, if not his best

Jonathan Kellerman's been writing Alex Delaware novels for a good long time now. I believe I read the first when it came out in paperback, and I've been a fan ever since. This latest entry is somewhere in the middle: not as good as his best books (lately I would rate Twisted the highest) but not as bad as some others. The author works the usual cameos into the main plot, mostly Petra Conner and Isaac Gomez, the main character of Twisted. This book mostly follows Alex and his long-time buddy Milo Sturgis, though Milo's partner Rick is also a character, more than he usually is.

One of the nurses who works in Rick's Emergency Room has died of cancer. The death is traumatic for everyone involved, because she was a steady, even-keeled woman who did a good job and was pretty much universally liked. She had raised her niece since the girl's mother abandoned the child with her sister and then went off and died in a motorcycle accident. The cancer victim's niece is concerned by a strange confession that her surrogate mother made on her deathbed, which seemed to imply that the lady had killed someone, somewhere in her past. Alex treated the nurse and mostly the daughter when they were younger, so when the young woman asks him and his friend Milo to investigate the claim, they dutifully begin to look into the circumstances of her life.

I enjoyed this book about as much as most of the Alex Delaware books. I will say that the plot is somewhat muddled and long, but those who aren't happy about that should note that with a detective story, the plot is always secondary to the characters and the atmosphere. Those are well-done here: Alex and Milo know where to get pancakes on Ventura Blvd. , and they move through a recognizable Southern California landscape. This is a good book.

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Another Excellent Entry in the Series

Jonathan Kellerman has done it again. He's created another thrilling and poignant novel in his long-running series about crime consulting psychologist Alex Deleware. While Alex is always an engaging narrator, much of the series appeal is due to the supporting cast. There's the brilliant, but very human detective, Milo Sturgis and lovely Robin, Alex's lady love to name two. But every character, even those that make only a brief appearance, are etched with the masterstrokes of a true craftsman. Although this one is less of a whodunit than a "whydunit," the villain is a perfect case study of what makes a sociopathic killer. The suspense is terrific, right up to the end, in typical Kellerman fashion. The climax will leave you breathless and concerned for one of the major players. Kellerman is such a master storyteller and writer that he makes it look easy with each new entry in his engaging series. He's one of the best writers out there. Don't wait . . . Buy Obession and bask in the immense pleasure of reading the latest in this truly excellent series.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

With scores of millions of books in print, translation into two dozen languages, and one of the most popular heroes in contemporary fiction to his name, #1 New York Times bestselling author Jonathan Kellerman is the unequivocal ?master of the psychological thriller? (People). In his newest novel Kellerman delivers a tour de force?poignant, dark, and chilling?that illuminates a shadowy world where impulse rules.

Tanya Bigelow was a solemn little girl when Dr. Alex Delaware successfully treated her obsessive-compulsive symptoms. Now, at nineteen, she still seems older than her years?but her problems go beyond hyper-maturity. Patty Bigelow, Tanya?s aunt and adoptive mother, has made a deathbed confession of murder and urged the young woman to seek Delaware?s help. The doctor recalls Patty as a selfless E.R. nurse struggling to raise a child on her own?a woman seemingly incapable of the ?terrible thing? she has admitted. But for Tanya?s peace of mind, Delaware agrees to investigate, and he enlists LAPD detective Milo Sturgis in the search for the phantom victim of a crime that may never have occurred.

Armed with only the vaguest details, psychologist and cop follow a trail twisting from L.A.?s sleaziest low-rent districts to its overblown mansions, retracing Patty and Tanya?s nomadic and increasingly puzzling life to the doorsteps of a sullen heroin addict; a randy real-estate broker; and a brilliant, enigmatic physics student. Suddenly a very real murder tears open a terrifying tunnel into the past, where secrets?and bodies?are buried. As the tension mounts, Delaware and Sturgis uncover a tangled history of desperation, vengeance, and death?a legacy of evil that refuses to die.

Dramatic, action-packed, and filled with the psychological detail that only Jonathan Kellerman can provide, Obsession is a whodunit, a whydunit?and something unique: a did-it-even-happen? This is Kellerman at his heart-racing best.

From the Hardcover edition.

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