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Friday 9 August 2013

Review: THE REAPERS

The Reapers by John Connolly
Read by Jeff Harding
Book 7 of Charlie Parker series
Genre: paranormal crime fiction
Format: hardback & unabridged audiobook

About The Reapers:
New York Times bestselling author John Connolly’s The Reapers , featuring private detective Charlie Parker, is now available from Encore.

As a small boy, Louis witnesses an unspeakable crime that takes the life of a member of his small, southern community. He grows up and moves on, but he is forever changed by the cruel and brutal nature of the act. Now, years later, someone is hunting him, targeting his home, his businesses, and his partner, Angel. The instrument of his revenge is Bliss, the most feared of assassins, a lethal killer of killers with a personal vendetta. Hardened by their pasts, Louis and Angel decide to strike back. But when they mysteriously disappear, their friends are forced to band together to find them. They are led by private detective Charlie Parker, a killer himself, a Reaper in waiting...and the harvest is about to begin.

Connolly creates a world where everyone is corrupt, and murderers go unpunished, but betrayals are always avenged. Mesmerizing, terrifying, and transfixing, The Reapers is yet another masterpiece from a proven talent.
Source: Info in the About The Reapers was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7143188-the-reapers on 27/10/2012.

Review:
I came into this book high from the ending from the last book. There were events there that seem to be escalating towards the paranormal level and I want to know what happens next. Charlie also experienced setbacks and I want to know how he is going to cope with it in this book. Halfway into the book and there was still no Charlie and I started to worry. The book was all about Louis and Angel. Which by the way, brings me to a point, I am still hoping that Connolly would one day explain why Louis adopted the symbolism of the "angel killing a snake". I can guess of course, but I would like a little more insight into Louis's psyche for that... Anyway, Charlie finally made an appearance and panic is over and I realized that it was designed to manipulate the tension building in the story. Fab!! However, having said that, I think that out of all the books in this series this book has the simplest plot. It was rather straight forward although the journey towards there was rather exciting and it was a tale well-told, still it was not as convoluted as some books in this series are. But still, John Connolly must have been firing on all cylinders when he wrote this book because the humour which I loved so much about this series (and had been somewhat lacking in the last few books) has come back on full throttle! It is just absolutely fantastic! Halfway through the book, it became apparently obvious that the events and the stars (so to speak) are re-aligning. New alliances forged and lines drawn. This book did not start off slow (maybe in part because I just came off Book 6). The book was interesting from the get go all the way through and picking up speed as it went along, gathering momentum until it blew up in my face in the end. Ahhh... I don't think that came out right... but yes, it was a bang at the end (figuratively speaking).
Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 5
Character development = 5
Story itself = 5
Ending = 4
World building = 5
Cover art = 4
Pace = N/A (11 hrs and 36 mins listening time)
Plot = 4.5
Narrator = 5

Overall Rating: 5 out of 5 cherries

2 comments:

Blodeuedd said...

I have read a few novellas by him, liked them, creepy ones

Jennifer @ Bad Bird Reads said...

Wow, the Reapers does sound really good. I never heard of this author but I will look closer now.

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