Crime novel set in Philadelphia
Two Detectives Kevin Byrne and Jessica Balzano are investigating the disappearance of Teenage girls, some are turning up murdered in strange circumstances. The Killer is playing a game with the Police.
He wants to kill 7 young Girls. He is a magician who tries to be one step ahead of the Police. He really likes puzzles. He is using landmarks around the city of Philadelphia were the Bodies turn up.
Police manage to rescue the last Girl I got a bit bored of this book and in the end I just wanted to finish it.
Very silly and far fetched. ( )

I LOVE this book!! Not many authors can totally stump me like this, and none of them have chilled me to the bone in many years... but this man did! I love everything about this series, and plan very soon to pick up the rest... and then sleep with the lights on!! And I grew up reading Koontz, King, Saul, and the like. :D
I am glad this one was my very first books of his, even though it's all out of order. I don't care, he's that good! ( )

In Philadelphia tauchen Leichen auf, deren Todesursache sehr mysteriös ist. So etwa ein Mädchen, das ertrunken ist. Der Fundort ist ein Keller, und es ist weit und breit kein Wasser zu finden. Und dann ist da noch eine exzentrische Dame, die …, nein, das sei hier nicht verraten.
Die Lektüre dieses Buchs hat mir gut gefallen. Es ist toll geschrieben und hat auch ein paar überraschende Wendungen zu bieten. Ich konnte wunderbar miträtseln und mich über die eine oder andere Begebenheit wundern. Der rätselhafte Plot hat seinen besonderen Reiz, aber gegen das Ende war es mir dann doch etwas arg konstruiert. Ich werde mir jedoch bestimmt ein Tangram kaufen.
Ein Zitat von George Bernard Shaw, welches in diesem Buch zu finden ist, hat mir gut gefallen und ich finde es sehr zutreffend, deshalb führe ich es hier auf: „Wie hören nicht auf zu spielen, weil wir alt werden, sondern wir werden alt, weil wir aufhören zu spielen.“ ( )

An excellent police procedural involving sleight-of-hand magic and games. The setting is familiar to me, so that was fun. The killer is the son of a magician who lives in an old mansion where he maintains a passion for puzzles and murder. (All of the clues point to a puzzle maniac.) An expert in disguise, he preys on runaway girls whom he lures into the hidden passageways of the old house where he fails to understand why they don’t appreciate his ministrations before he kills (sacrifices, really) them as part of his Seven Wonders.

Detectives Kevin Byrne and Jessica Balazano are competent and what begins as the investigation of a cold case turns into a very hot one indeed. The gradual uncovering of geographical clues and fitting them together into a tangram was clever. The partners work well together even with their own demons, and it was refreshing to have partners of the opposite sex who didn’t feel it necessary to tangle in the sheets. Not that I have anything against that, it’s just hard to make it realistic and solve crimes at the same time.

It was also fun to recognize Philadelphia landmarks where I went to school. The first nine-tenths of the book were really quite good, but much like chess where the endgame is usually the most difficult, the denouement left me slightly unsatisfied and felt rushed. Everything is tied together too neatly and unnecessarily in the last few pages.

Nevertheless, I stayed up too late to finish this book.

Whether I give 3 or 4 stars to a book I like often depends more on what time of day it is, if I have papers to grade, if the sun is shining, the outside temperature, if I've just eaten, etc., so let's consider this 3.567498 stars which I will round up to four. ( )

This book is ok, I guess, but I wouldn't read it twice. ( )