Member Review
Review by
Aravind R, Reviewer
James Patterson’s Alex Cross series has endured for almost three decades, bringing to readers worldwide the unadulterated storytelling prowess of one of the most prolific and biggest selling authors in the world today. Fear No Evil, the 29th Alex Cross novel, had me excited from the moment I received the e-ARC courtesy of the author and the publishers via the lovely NetGalley!
Cross and his best friend John Sampson are barely hours away from embarking on an adventure trip into the wilderness of Montana, away from the city in all senses. As expected, their vacation ends even before it starts, when the body of a highly respected CIA operative is found along with a handwritten letter confessing to being sold out to a Mexican cartel. Soon, more law enforcement personnel start to turn up dead, seemingly the victims of some vigilante group, and Cross and the FBI rush from state to state in an effort to identify and stop the killers. To complicate matters further, the cartel, as per its own twisted logic, retaliates by slaughtering the victims’ families to scare the prospective confessors into silence. Amidst all this, Cross starts to receive some text messages from an old nemesis of his—known only as M—who seems to know a lot about the present case, as well as the intimate details of Cross’s family and friends. The breath-taking chase culminates in a final showdown in the treacherous wilderness where Cross and Sampson are up against not one but two sets of lethal assassins and, far more dangerous than both, grizzly bears!
I’ve lost touch with Patterson’s writing—his own, not his collaborations—for quite sometime and this one felt a bit different from the only other Alex Cross novel I’ve read, Along Came a Spider. While the series starter was a gripping suspense thriller where Alex pitted his wits against a shrewd serial killer, the latest one is low on suspense or mystery and pretty high on action. There is a prodigious body count and pulse-pounding action to match in Fear No Evil. There are many twists, some the reader could foresee and some quite unexpected. Running simultaneously with the breakneck action is the theme of family, friendship, love and loyalty that lends a nice human touch to the novel. Tiny chapters, sharp dialogues, crisp descriptions and the endearing characters from Cross’s and Sampson’s families—Nana Mama, Ali and Willow especially—make this one a lightning fast, fun read. The sub-plots involving the exploits of Bree Stone—Cross’s wife and former Metro PD detective—on her mission to Paris to nab a rotten, embezzling billionaire, and Ali Cross’s skills of detection, are engaging, too.
There are things that didn’t work for me, as well, in Fear No Evil. About twenty years after he first appeared, M is as elusive as ever, and that is just not done. And there are a few questions—questions I can’t mention here for fear of spoiling it—that are left unanswered, perhaps to hook the reader onto the next episode; but someone of Patterson’s stature doesn’t have to do that, does he?
Fear No Evil is a great addition to the beloved Alex Cross series and I sincerely wish that Patterson writes more and more on his own rather than collaborating with other writers…
Cross and his best friend John Sampson are barely hours away from embarking on an adventure trip into the wilderness of Montana, away from the city in all senses. As expected, their vacation ends even before it starts, when the body of a highly respected CIA operative is found along with a handwritten letter confessing to being sold out to a Mexican cartel. Soon, more law enforcement personnel start to turn up dead, seemingly the victims of some vigilante group, and Cross and the FBI rush from state to state in an effort to identify and stop the killers. To complicate matters further, the cartel, as per its own twisted logic, retaliates by slaughtering the victims’ families to scare the prospective confessors into silence. Amidst all this, Cross starts to receive some text messages from an old nemesis of his—known only as M—who seems to know a lot about the present case, as well as the intimate details of Cross’s family and friends. The breath-taking chase culminates in a final showdown in the treacherous wilderness where Cross and Sampson are up against not one but two sets of lethal assassins and, far more dangerous than both, grizzly bears!
I’ve lost touch with Patterson’s writing—his own, not his collaborations—for quite sometime and this one felt a bit different from the only other Alex Cross novel I’ve read, Along Came a Spider. While the series starter was a gripping suspense thriller where Alex pitted his wits against a shrewd serial killer, the latest one is low on suspense or mystery and pretty high on action. There is a prodigious body count and pulse-pounding action to match in Fear No Evil. There are many twists, some the reader could foresee and some quite unexpected. Running simultaneously with the breakneck action is the theme of family, friendship, love and loyalty that lends a nice human touch to the novel. Tiny chapters, sharp dialogues, crisp descriptions and the endearing characters from Cross’s and Sampson’s families—Nana Mama, Ali and Willow especially—make this one a lightning fast, fun read. The sub-plots involving the exploits of Bree Stone—Cross’s wife and former Metro PD detective—on her mission to Paris to nab a rotten, embezzling billionaire, and Ali Cross’s skills of detection, are engaging, too.
There are things that didn’t work for me, as well, in Fear No Evil. About twenty years after he first appeared, M is as elusive as ever, and that is just not done. And there are a few questions—questions I can’t mention here for fear of spoiling it—that are left unanswered, perhaps to hook the reader onto the next episode; but someone of Patterson’s stature doesn’t have to do that, does he?
Fear No Evil is a great addition to the beloved Alex Cross series and I sincerely wish that Patterson writes more and more on his own rather than collaborating with other writers…
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