I read my brother’s favorite thrillers, here’s what I thought
With recent world events, I’ve been staying at my parents’ place (I’ll take a house and garden over small apartment any day) and I found myself quickly running out of reading material. I turned to my brother’s bookshelf which includes Macedonian translations of titles by James Patterson, Rober Ludlum, Daniel Silva, Donato Carrisi, etc and decided to pick a few to read.
After some consideration, I narrowed down the selection to the following six titles:
Cross Country by James Patterson
The English Assassin by Daniel Silva
The Scarlatti Inheritance by Robert Ludlum
The Girl in the Fog by Donato Carrisi
Things didn’t kick off very well. Out of the six titles, I marked 3 as DNF-ed or ‘did not finish’ on my Goodreads shelf. I found one to be rather boring, another I didn’t care for, whilst the third I just couldn’t get into.
Let’s start start with Daniel Silva – the book I gave the highest rating to.
The English Assassin
Book #2 in the Gabriel Allon 20-book-series, where each book can also be read independently. The Goodreads synopsis reads:
When art restorer and occasional Israeli agent Gabriel Allon is sent to Zurich, Switzerland, to restore the painting of a reclusive millionaire banker, he arrives to find his would-be employer murdered at the foot of his Raphael. A secret collection of priceless, illicitly gained Impressionist masterpieces is missing. Gabriel’s handlers step out of the shadows to admit the truth-the collector had been silenced-and Gabriel is put back in the high-stakes spy game, battling wits with the rogue assassin he helped to train.
Overall, this was a good mystery thriller. A peculiar spy main character and Switzerland as the backdrop, paired with a good deal of European travel, business intrigues and World War II works of art. I found myself quickly turning the pages and read this in just over 4 hours.
My interest was piqued enough that I may just read some more Allon books.
The other two were a bit more on the disappointing side.
The Girl in the Fog
By Donato Carrisi is a standalone novel. The Goodreads synopsis reads:
A man is arrested in the small town of Avechot. His shirt is covered in blood. Could this have anything to do with a missing girl called Anna Lou?
Detective Vogel will do anything to solve the mystery surrounding Anna Lou’s disappearance. When a media storm hits the quiet town, Vogel is sure that the suspect will be flushed out. Yet the clues are confusing, perhaps false, and following them may be a far cry from discovering the truth at the heart of a dark town.
I found myself not caring much for this story. It was poorly written and I couldn’t wait for it to be over. Where other mysteries would intrigue me enough to try and solve the puzzle, this was vague, with weak characters and I didn’t care to solve the case. I don’t think I’ll be reading any more Carrisi books.
Cross Country
By James Patterson, also known as book #14 in the Alex Cross series, was also a big flop. The Goodreads synopsis reads:
When the home of Alex Cross’s longtime friend Ellie Cox is turned into the worst murder scene Alex has ever seen, he is devastated. The destruction leads him to believe that he’s chasing a horrible new breed of killer. As Alex and his girlfriend Brianna Stone begin the hunt for the villain responsible for the killings, they quickly find themselves entangled in the deadly Nigerian underworld of Washington, D.C. What they discover is shocking: a strongly organized gang of teenage thugs headed by a powerful, diabolical man—The Tiger.
I didn’t like the writing in this one. Pair up the astonishing number of plot holes (that are not from this being a series!) with all the inconsistencies and you won’t get a thrilling read. The short chapters and quick pacing will make this a quick read. But, is it a memorable story?
In summary, it’s obvious my brother and I have very different reading tastes. Where I like Stieg Larrson, he prefers Robert Ludlum and that’s absolutely okay. One cannot argue anybody else’s reading tastes. But, I don’t think I’ll go raid his shelves again anytime soon.
Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them?
English 
Macedonian