1/26/2020

Weekly Book Wrap-Up #101 – Fire In The Sky


With the Weekly Book Wrap-Up, I give you a bit of an insight into all the new books that have arrived at my place. No matter if I won a giveaway, got approved for a reviewer´s copy, an ARC or just bought one myself. Everything that I add to my shelves, in what way ever and read during the past week or am still reading, I will write about it.  And maybe I tell you a bit about the upcoming things on Inkvotary, that is if I don´t forget it and have something to share with you *smile*

I am linking up with Tynga´s Reviews and Caffeinated Reviewer and hope you´ll have fun reading it and maybe get the one or the other book inspiration.


Stacking The Shelves #101

I am thinking of stopping this meme here because most of the time I have no new books to present. Instead, I sound like a cracked record. 





Sunday Post #58

It feels weird that I am, besides a young couple downstairs, the only person who lives in her apartment on that side of the building. The people who lived in the two other apartments below mine have moved out and I can feel that nobody is turning the heat on. My floors are freezing cold!

On Wednesday the sky was light up by the fire. I could see the flames through my kitchen window late at night. The building of a nearby company was on fire and the sky was filled with dust, yellow, orange and a bright white from the fire. The next day, when I walked to my local supermarket, I saw the damage with my own eyes. The streets were black from all the water the fire department had to use (they are normally grey) and because we have very cold nights, they also had to use something to prevent the streets from becoming icy. Must have been one hell of an awful night for the fire department as well as the company itself.

Other than that, the week was a silent and uneventful one.

How was your week?



Happy reading

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1/24/2020

The Witness by Nora Roberts


A book I´ve read many, many years ago. It is one of those NR books I call a page-turner and one of her best works if you ask me. The combination of crime, romance, and very well created characters gives this story the special something. You experience a permanent thrill from the first page to the last and that is what a reader is looking for in a book.


The Witness
by Nora Roberts
Publisher Penguin Random House on April 17, 2012
Genre Contemporary Romance
Pages 496
Format Hardcover
✶✶✶✶✶ 

Daughter of a cold, controlling mother and an anonymous donor, studious, obedient Elizabeth Fitch finally let loose one night, drinking too much at a nightclub and allowing a strange man’s seductive Russian accent to lure her to a house on Lake Shore Drive. Twelve years later, the woman now known as Abigail Lowery lives alone on the outskirts of a small town in the Ozarks. A freelance security systems designer, her own protection is supplemented by a fierce dog and an assortment of firearms. She keeps to herself, saying little, revealing nothing. Unfortunately, that seems to be the quickest way to get attention in a tiny southern town. The mystery of Abigail Lowery and her sharp mind, secretive nature and unromantic viewpoint intrigues local police chief Brooks Gleason, on both a personal and professional level. And while he suspects that Abigail needs protection from something, Gleason is accustomed to two-bit troublemakers, not the powerful and dangerous men who are about to have him in their sights. And Abigail Lowery, who has built a life based on security and self-control, is at risk of losing both.
Story
One night of rebellion and nothing in Abigail Lowery's life is what it used to be. She lives the life of a hermit, goes shopping very early in the morning and trains daily with her dog Bert - not exactly what you can call an exciting everyday life. But then police officer Brooks enters her life, and Abigail begins a period of change and passion.

Style
Nora Robert's writing style is fluid, the reading speed is easy and the plot brilliant. The author has once again managed to create fascinating characters and a captivating story that is not only entertaining but also presents the subject of forgery, programming language, and security in an entertaining way. The Russian mafia - the Bratva - serves as the background and gives the novel an exciting setting. The personal narrative style created by the two characters Abigail and Brooks creates an incredible atmosphere, which is sometimes very upsetting and scary, but never loses its credibility and conviction.

Characters
The most varied characters come together here, enchant, seduce, beat around, provoke, intrigue and kill. The author created warm-hearted figures, cold-hearted ones and those who are simply unable to feel. Dr. Susan Fitch, Abigail's mother - or rather, her producer and educator is the latter. This highly successful surgeon is as far away from a mother as the earth is from the moon. She dictates and determines everything, gives instructions and orders that are lawful for Abigail, and yet, in the end, she has to admit that her project “to be a mother” failed miserably. Abigail finds everything a loving and caring mother can give in Brook´s mother Sunny O'Hara. That woman is full of life, creativity and a clear attitude towards weapons. And she effortlessly succeeds in what Susan Fitch couldn't do for over 16 years: she overwhelms Abigail in a positive sense with her motherliness.


Conclusion
Extremely sensitive, eloquent and written with wonderful humor. This story is a fascinating and wonderfully entertaining novel, full of suspense, drama and unbeatable logic. The Witness has captivated me from the first to the last page. Here you will find a great story between the book covers, which should not only delight Nora Robert fans.


Happy reading







Nora Roberts
Nora Roberts ©Bruce Wilder




Nora Roberts, born in Silver Spring, Maryland, is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of more than 200 novels. During the now-famous blizzard, she pulled out a pencil and notebook and began to write. It was there that a career was born. Several manuscripts and rejections later, her first book, Irish Thoroughbred, was published by Silhouette in 1981. Having spent her life surrounded by men, Ms. Roberts has a fairly good view of the workings of the male mind, which is a constant delight to her readers. It was, she’s been quoted as saying, a choice between figuring men out or running away screaming. Nora is a member of several writers groups and has won countless awards from her colleagues and the publishing industry. Recently The New Yorker called her “America’s favorite novelist.” She is also the author of the bestselling futuristic suspense series written under the pen name J. D. Robb. There are more than 500 million copies of her books in print.

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1/22/2020

Waiting On Wednesday #124 – Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo


is a weekly event that was originally hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. This meme is a place that spotlights upcoming releases that we´re eagerly anticipating with pure joy. 

There are a lot of new books coming out each year and some of them catch my attention and will get a spotlight in my Waiting on Wednesday post. While some of them will finally end up here at my place, others won´t. I am joining Tressa at Wishful Endings and her meme Can´t-Wait Wednesday.

The English edition is already out and was made a Goodreads Choice 2019 winner. This Waiting on Wednesday post is about the German edition who will be published as paperback within the next few weeks. I don´t know why that is, but somehow the blue and black of the German cover speaks more to me than the original cover does. If everything goes as planned, then this will be my first Leigh Bardugo read. The summary sounds interesting enough to get my attention and with all the Tweets I´ve read during the past weeks and months about this book and the author´s other work, I am more than curious to see if this one is readable without any knowledge about her previous work and figures or not. If you know any book by the author, what do you think? 


                           
Das Neunte Haus
Author Leigh Bardugo
Publishing Date February 3, 2020
Publisher Knaur
Format Paperback
Goodreads


Galaxy “Alex” Stern is the most unlikely member of Yale’s freshman class. Raised in the Los Angeles hinterlands by a hippie mom, Alex dropped out of school early and into a world of shady drug dealer boyfriends, dead-end jobs, and much, much worse. By age twenty, in fact, she is the sole survivor of a horrific, unsolved multiple homicide. Some might say she’s thrown her life away. But at her hospital bed, Alex is offered a second chance: to attend one of the world’s most elite universities on a full ride. What’s the catch, and why her? Still searching for answers to this herself, Alex arrives in New Haven tasked by her mysterious benefactors with monitoring the activities of Yale’s secret societies. These eight windowless “tombs” are well-known to be haunts of the future rich and powerful, from high-ranking politicos to Wall Street and Hollywood’s biggest players. But their occult activities are revealed to be more sinister and more extraordinary than any paranoid imagination might conceive.





And what are you waiting for? Let me know your thoughts about this one or leave me the link to your WoW and I check it out.


Happy reading & waiting on







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1/21/2020

Top Ten Most Recent Additions To My Bookshelf


Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. This week the theme is about my recent additions to my bookshelf.

I haven´t bought many books over the past few months or weeks. Don´t ask me why. But unlike some other book bloggers, I didn´t set myself under a no-book-buying-order. It just happened. But nonetheless, I received some new books. Most of them are from publishers, some I won in giveaways and the one or the other I bought myself. The following list shows the books in the order they arrived at my place with the first one, Darkdawn, being my latest addition.



Darkdawn by Jay Kristoff






The greatest games in grave´s history have ended with the most audacious murders in the history of the Itreyan Republic. Mia Cordeve, gladiatii, escaped slave and infamous assassin, is on the run. Pursued by Blades of the Red Church and soldier of the Luminatii legion, she may never escape the City of Bridges and Bones alive. Her mentor Mercurio is now in the clutches of her enemies. Her own family wishes her dead. And her nemesis, Consul Julius Scaeva, stands but a breath from total dominance over the Republic. But beneath the city, a dark secret awaits. Together with her lover Ashlinn, brother Jonnen and a mysterious benefactor returned from beyond the veil of death, she must undertake a perilous journey across the Republic, seeking the final answer to the riddle of her life. Truedark approaches. Night is falling on the Republish for perhaps the final time. Can Mia survive in a world where even daylight must die?









The young seer Vasiliki escaped the shamanic tradition of her aunt in 1812 in order to live a Christian life. But instead of getting married as promised, she ends up in the harem of the cruel Ali Paschá, who uses dark forces to drive Christians and Muslims into hatred, war and death. The further Vasiliki penetrates into the past and the labyrinth of secrets of the ruler, the more clearly she recognizes the involvement of her own clan in a danger that affects both Christians and Muslims: it is about the power of the jinn, whom God gave a chance, if they prove the moral reprehensibility of man. Using her life, Vasiliki must learn that every religion has a dark side, against whose power only mercy helps ... (personal translation by ©Vi at Inkvotary).


Never Let Me Fall by Abbie Roads






Thomas Brown can´t see color. But he can see people´s true souls. His abilities allow him to work with criminal investigators and deliver justice to families of the wronged. And he is starting to accept that his life will forever be in black and white … Then he encounters Helena Grayse, and everything changes. She brings vibrant color to his world, and he brings acceptance and belief to hers. But Helena´s past is quickly catching up with her, and Thomas is in the crosshairs. As an enemy hidden in plain sight threatens their every move, they´ll have to rely on their love to beat the darkness. (personal translation by ©Vi at Inkvotary).


For a woman being killed by someone who claims to love her is the most ordinary murder of all. With its antebellum houses and ancient oak trees draped in a veil of Spanish moss, Savannah´s graceful downtown is famous around the world. When a woman is killed in the heart of that affluent district, the shock is felt throughout the city. But for crime reporter Harper McClain, this story is personal. The corpse has a familiar face. Only twenty-four-years old, Naomi Scott was just getting started. A law student, tending bar to make ends meet, she wanted to change the world. Instead, her life ended in the dead of night at the hands of an unseen gunman. There are no witnesses to the crime. The police have three suspects: Scott´s boyfriend, who has a criminal past he claims he´s put behind him, her boss, who stalked another young bartender two years ago, and the district attorney´s son, who Naomi dated until their relationship ended in acrimony. All three men claim to love her. Could one of them be her killer?
With the whole city demanding answers, Harper unravels a tangled story of obsession and jealousy. But the pressures on her go beyond murder. The newspaper is facing more layoffs. Her boss fears both their jobs are on the line. And Harper begins to realize that someone is watching her every move. Some familiar and very dangerous.
Someone who told her to run before it´s too late …









The first battle is already over, but the big fight for good and evil is yet to come: The young Fallon leads their army to Washington D.C., to drive the black magic out of the world. She is the chosen one to rebuild the world after the apocalypse and unite her inhabitants. There is a great burden on the young woman, because the family of her father´s murderer seeks revenge on her and her sweetheart. But Fallon´s mission is now easier than the interpretation of her feelings for Duncan, whose fate is inevitably tied to hers.









After being pronounced Queen of Faerie and then abruptly exiled by the Wicked King Cardan, Jude finds herself unmoored, the queen of nothing. She spends her time with Vivi and Oak, watches her fair share of reality-television, and does the odd job or two, including trying to convince a cannibalistic faerie from hunter her own in the mortal world. When her twin sister Taryn shows up asking for a favor, Jude jumps at the chance to return to the Faerie world, even if it means facing Cardan, who she loves despite his betrayal. When a dark curse is unveiled, Jude must become the first mortal Queen of Faerie and uncover how to break the curse, or risk upsetting the balance of the whole Faerie world.









Victor Vale and Eli Ever want to die. Not to stay dead, but to resurrect with extraordinary abilities. As young, brilliant medical students, they know exactly what they are doing. They plan the experiment meticulously and have success: Both come transformed back into life. Eli develops and amazing regenerative power and becomes virtually immortal, Victor can inflict or take pain to others. What they are not in control of is the tragedy triggered by their experiment. Because super powers alone do not make heroes …









It´s 2002, a year after 9/11. It´s an extremely turbulent time politically, but especially so for someone like Shirin, a sixteen-year-old Muslim girl who´s tired of being stereotyped. Shirin is never surprised by how horrible people can be. She´s tired of the rude stares, the degrading comments – even the physical violence – she endures as a result of her race, her religion, and the hijab she wears every day. So she´s built up protective walls and refuses to let anyone close enough to hurt her. Instead, she drowns her frustrations in music and spends her afternoons break-dancing with her brother. But then she meets Ocean James. He´s the first person in forever who really seems to want to get to know Shirin. It terrifies her – they seem to come from two irreconcilable worlds – and Shirin has had her guard up for so long that she´s not sure she´ll ever be able to let it down.









In the dome of the Berlin Cathedral hangs a cruelly torn dead with black wings. It is the prominent Cathedral Priest Dr. Brigitte Riss. She wears a key around her neck. In the handle, the number 17 is carved. Tom Babylon of the LKA wants this case at any price. Because with this key disappeared many years ago his little sister Viola. But Tom gets an unpleasant partner for the investigation. The psychologist Sita Johanns soon wonders who has more to hide in this case: Tom or the murderer, who drives them both mercilessly before him. (personal translation by ©Vi at Inkvotary).









At the opening event of the Berlinale, a snuff film will be shown to everyone´s horror. The victim: the daughter of the mayor Otto Keller. Tom Babylon from the LKA and the psychologist Sita Johanns investigate under pressure. But a group of celebrities around Keller walls. What does the mayor have to hide? And who is the witness who looks like Tom Babylon´s since years missing sister? The events turn over when another murder happens. Sita Johanns suddenly finds that there is a connection between her and the victims: a terrible event in her youth – and the number nineteen. (personal translation by ©Vi at Inkvotary).


Happy reading







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1/19/2020

Weekly Book Wrap-Up #100 – Lights On


With the Weekly Book Wrap-Up, I give you a bit of an insight into all the new books that have arrived at my place. No matter if I won a giveaway, got approved for a reviewer´s copy, an ARC or just bought one myself. Everything that I add to my shelves, in what way ever and read during the past week or am still reading, I will write about it.  And maybe I tell you a bit about the upcoming things on Inkvotary, that is if I don´t forget it and have something to share with you *smile*

I am linking up with Tynga´s Reviews and Caffeinated Reviewer and hope you´ll have fun reading it and maybe get the one or the other book inspiration.


Stacking The Shelves #100

I received the German edition of Darkdawn by Fischer Tor and am very happy about it. You can see the German edition on the left side, the English on the right side.

 





Sunday Post #57

I finally could bring up my kitchen lights again, after I had to put them down so that the mason was able to repair the wall last December. After being without any electrical light for almost a month it feels like heaven. After that, I went through all the stuff that is still in boxes and stored in the little space behind my kitchen. Spring is coming soon, and I am in the mood for a “spring clean”. A very early one, sure, but I can´t do all in one day. After only three hours of lifting boxes through a tiny door and going through them, sorting and throwing out I was absolutely exhausted and had enough.

How was your week?



Happy reading







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1/17/2020

Elementals-Ice Wolves by Amie Kaufman


This is one of the books I was literally kind of dancing around at my local library for weeks. The cover and summary kind of spoke to me but on the other hand, I wasn´t sure if I should borrow and read it. Well, as you can see now, I changed my mind and it was somehow worth it. Good, I am not completely thrilled and it took some time to read this novel, but the idea behind it, and the way how the author created her own world with Dragons and Wolves in it, is very well created and described.


Elementals-Ice Wolves
by Amie Kaufman
Elementals Series #1
Publisher Harper Collins on March 27, 2018
Genre Fantasy
Pages 352
Format Hardcover
Source Library 
✶✶✶✶ 

Everyone in Vallen knows that ice wolves and scorch dragons are sworn enemies who live deeply separate lives. So when twelve-year-old orphan Anders takes one elemental form and his twin sister, Rayna, takes another, he wonders whether they are even related. Still, whether or not they’re family, Rayna is Anders’s only true friend. She’s nothing like the brutal, cruel dragons who claimed her as one of their own and stole her away. In order to rescue her, Anders must enlist at the foreboding Ulfar Academy, a school for young wolves that values loyalty to the pack above all else. But for Anders, loyalty is more complicated than obedience, and friendship is the most powerful shapeshifting force of all.
Story
Rayna and Anders are living on the street. Each day is a fight and they sometimes struggle to get enough food or money to buy some. All that changes the moment when Rayna is forced to defend Anders and starts to change into a Dragon. In Vallen, their hometown, Dragons are the enemy and within no time the life Rayna and Anders knew changes completely. To save Rayna, Anders must join the Ulfar Academy to find his twin and get her back. But is that, what Rayna wants? And why is everyone making such a secret about the past and the Dragons at Ulfar? 

Style
Not sure why it took me so long to read this book. It is a wonderful fantasy novel about two different creatures who live with many misunderstandings in the same area. Good, the idea with the dragons isn´t new. I´ve read other fantasy books that had dragons in their stories too. But in combination with wolves, it was somehow new to me. 

The writing style is soft, easy to read and easy to understand. The twins Rayna and Anders try their best to survive each day in a town where life isn´t easy. What I loved most about this novel was the scenery the author had created. I literally saw the green roof gardens with all the flowers, herbs and other blooming green Rayna and her brother loved to walk through to get from one side of the town to the other. The picture I saw before my inner eye was not only beautiful but also in some ways new.  

Characters
For Anders, it becomes soon very clear that somewhen in the past things must have been different. Completely different. But why things are now the way they are is not clear to him. All he knows is, that he must learn as much as he can about Dragons and the artifacts and that the best place to do so is the Academy. The only big challenge is, he has never really learned how to read. Yes, he can read single words and most of his life he simply studied a map by memorizing it but reading huge books is a completely different number. 

The way how the author tells the reader that Anders is dyslexic was not only told in a sensitive way but also made me become a big fan of the protagonist. He is not like all the others but in a positive way. He sees things differently, thinks differently and what others see as natural and normal, is for Anders anything but. So far, one of my favorite figures in this series. 



Conclusion
A wonderful to read a book that shows you a fantastic fantasy world full of misunderstandings, hate, and secrets. The cliffhanger at the end was a shock and I hope that the next book will have not only an answer to some of my questions but also be as diverse and full of tension as this one has been. 



Happy reading







Amie Kaufman
Amie Kaufman ©private




Amie Kaufman grew up just one block from her local library and took full advantage of that fact. She spent her childhood summers re-creating with her sister their favorite books by camping in the back yard, mapping their neighborhood, climbing trees and kissing the Blarney stone six times, thoroughly cementing her gift of the gab. She graduated with honors degrees in history, literature and law, and a master´s degree in conflict resolution. Today she´s a full-time writer and lives with her husband and her rescue dog in Melbourne, Australia. 

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1/16/2020

2020 The Backlist Reader Challenge – Sign-Up


This reading challenge is focused on knocking off titles that have been on the TBR for a while, or even ones that got pushed aside for new releases and is hosted by The Bookwyrm´s Hoard. To be honest, I wasn´t sure which challenge, concerning my TBR, I would like to do in 2020. Sometimes I like to do things a bit different and with all the changes I´ve done lately in my life, why not do a different backlist challenge. I looked around, read all the rules the other challenges require you to do when signing up and well, what can I say? So, The Backlist Reader Challenge is what I am doing this year again and I am looking forward to seeing how far I will come.


My Goal

My goal for this challenge is to read at least 8 books. I know, that doesn´t sound very much, but I am simply not sure how the year will be and I rather keep things low and get surprised with more than the other way around. I hate it when I fail at something. Yup, we are talking about reading books, having fun and do a challenge along the way. And all of this is meant to happen in a way that is enjoyable, pleasure and relaxing. So eight it is...



Rules

The challenge will run from January 1, 2020, to December 31, 2020. It ends at midnight in whatever time zone you are in. You have an entire year to complete your goal!

The rules are simple. Only (1) and (2) are mandatory.

(1) To count for the challenge, books have to be published before 2019 AND already be on your TBR list or pile.
... In other words, you don’t have to own the book. If it was on your want-to-read list when you signed up for the challenge, and it came out in 2018 or earlier, it counts… regardless of format (ebook, print book, audiobook) and how you acquired it. You can count rereads if (a) you haven’t read the book in the last 10 years, and (b) you can’t remember any more of it than you would learn by reading the publisher’s blurb.

(2) Create a goal or sign-up post on your blog or wherever you usually post your reviews
... (e.g., Goodreads, LibraryThing, Instagram.). Please link back to The Bookwyrm´s Hoard. Then link your sign-up post in the linky here at The Bookwyrm´s Hoard where you see the “Add your link” button. (Please link the actual goals/sign-up post, not your home page.)  You can set your own goal, and you can list the books you want to read this year or leave it up to your mood at the time—as long as they are already on your TBR list when you sign up! You can sign up through December 1, 2020; after that, the sign-up link will be closed.

(3) (Optional) Review the books you read and post the links on the review linky
... (reachable through the top menu bar at The Bookwyrm´s Hoard.) You can certainly do the challenge without writing reviews, but the review links are your entries for the year-end giveaway. Reviews don’t have to be that long. A few sentences is fine. You can post them on Goodreads or LibraryThing if you don’t have a blog. Please link to your review itself (not to your blog´s main page, your profile, or the book’s Goodreads or LibraryThing page.)

(4) (Optional) On or just after the end of the year, post a wrap-up post to let us know how you did! There will be a link-up post created for the wrap-up posts, too. It is just for fun.



Please use #BacklistReader on Twitter, Facebook, and where ever hashtags in social media are useful.

There will be at least one giveaway: a $15 Amazon gift certificate or up to that amount in books from Book Depository.  The winner will be chosen at random from the review links at the end of the year. The Bookwyrm´s Hoard might throw the occasional Twitter party as well, but you don’t have to attend. All you really need to participate are two things:  a to-read list, and a way to sign up and link your reviews.

You can find the review linky on the top menu bar at The Bookwyrm´s Hoard homepage, with a link from the sidebar as well. The review linky will go “live” on January 1, 2020. It will stay open through January 5, 2021, to give you a couple of days to review any books you finished on December 31.



Happy reading & Good luck







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1/15/2020

Blindsighted by Karin Slaughter


I read the author´s debut thriller about ten years ago and it made me a Slaughter fan within no time. Never before had I read something like it and for me, it was back then quite clear, that I had to read all the other books of this series too. With Sara, the author has created a woman like no other. And for me, Sara was the perfect figure to do the job of the coroner in the Grant County series. So, if you are not familiar with this series, I suggest you start reading it. 


Blindsighted*
by Karin Slaughter
Grant County Series #1
Publisher Arrow on June 23, 2011
Genre Thriller
Pages 416
Format Paperback
✶✶✶✶½ 

The sleepy town of Heartsdale, Georgia, is jolted into panic when Sara Linton, pediatrician and medical examiner, finds Sibyl Adams dead in the local diner. As well as being viciously raped, Sibyl has been cut: two deep knife wounds form a lethal cross over her stomach. But it's only once Sara starts to perform the post-mortem that the full extent of the killer's brutality becomes clear. Police chief Jeffrey Tolliver - Sara's ex-husband - is in charge of the investigation, and when a second victim is found, crucified, only a few days later, both Jeffrey and Sara have to face the fact that Sibyl's murder wasn't a one-off attack. What they're dealing with is a seasoned sexual predator. A violent serial killer...
Story
A college professor is brutally beaten up and found lying in her dying by Sara Linton on the toilet of a diner. The autopsy of the body shows that the body was not only raped cruelly but was literally pumped to the brim with Belladonna, a dangerous poison. While Sara and her ex-husband, chief of police Jeffrey Tolliver, are still puzzling over who could have done this and why the next badly battered young woman is already in front of Sara´s clinic. This time Sara wins the fight for her life. But then the sadistic beast strikes again and kidnaps Lena, a colleague of Jeffrey. And when Sara´s life is suddenly in great danger she and Jeffrey are certain who must be the culprit and a merciless struggle to survive in the ice-cold sea begins.

Style
I have rarely read as bloody and detailed as Karin Slaughter describes the terrible events and yet remains stylish and readable without falling into the fray. Eloquent and full of emotion, the author shows her characters and what they experience. In some places, I had to swallow a bit when the language became a bit obscene and very direct, but somehow it always seemed to fit, whether it was the character or the scene in general. The language the author gives her figures never seemed out of place. The fact that the plot takes place within a week is frightening and remarkable at the same time because the author undoubtedly uses it as a stylistic element.  

Characters
Karin Slaughter lets the reader take an insight into the emotional world of the different characters and is still careful not to fall into any clichés. The figures are individual and realistic, convincing and have all their reasons why they act the way they do. Only the figure of the perpetrator could not completely convince me. 

The protagonist Sara is a remarkable character. On the one hand, she wants to get rid of her ex-husband, on the other hand, her professional life and the fact that they both live in the same place and work are not exactly designed for this to actually happen. She is the coroner of the city where he is chief of police. Cooperation is inevitable. 

Sara is not a typical southern woman. Large, red-haired and untidy in terms of private life, she is all the more orderly in terms of her professional life. Since it is almost pedantically perfect. Where other women offer their husband a homely home with a table full of delicious delicacies when he comes home from work, it is more the man who has to take care of the cooking and cleaning up. Still, Sara is not an emotionally cold woman, on the contrary. Her family and children are more important to her. But also, her job as a pediatrician. 


Conclusion
Karin Slaughter writes in a very impressive way. Blindsighted is an incredibly bloody story that is exciting from the first to the last line and comes up with many surprises. Good, I didn´t find a few things convincing but the idea and plot are captivating, and this thriller always provides you with some reading pleasure. If you don´t know the author yet or do and somehow have not read her Grant County series yet, this is the perfect start.



Happy reading







Karin Slaughter
Karin Slaughter ©Alison Rosa




Karin Slaughter, born 1971, is from Atlanta, Georgia. In 2003 her debut novel Blindsighted was published and went straight to the top of the international bestselling list and catapulted her onto the Thriller-Olympus. She is the #1 internationally bestselling author of more than a dozen novels, including the Will Trent and Grant County series and the instant New York Times bestselling standalones, Cop Town and Pretty Girls. There are more than 35 million copies of her books in print around the world.

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1/13/2020

The Surgeon by Tess Gerritsen


I discovered this fantastic series some years ago. It was from the start a thrill and the author has managed to fascinate me more or less with her books ever since. I don´t know what exactly it is or was that fascinated me from the beginning but to read about Rizzoli, the way how she acts, thinks and goes through life has made me smile and shake my head often enough in humor or disbelief. What a woman! 


The Surgeon
by Tess Gerritsen
Rizzoli & Isles Series #1
Publisher Ballantine Books on August 21, 2001
Genre Thriller
Pages 359
Format Hardcover
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He slips into their homes at night and walks silently into bedrooms where women lie sleeping, unaware of the horrors they soon will endure. The precision of the killer's methods suggests he is a deranged man of medicine, propelling the Boston newspapers and the frightened public to name him "The Surgeon." The cops' only clue rests with another surgeon, the victim of a nearly identical crime. Two years ago, Dr. Catherine Cordell fought back and killed her attacker before he could complete his assault. Now she hides her fears of intimacy behind a cool and elegant exterior and a well-earned reputation as a top trauma surgeon. Cordell's careful facade is about to crack as this new killer recreates, with chilling accuracy, the details of Cordell's own ordeal. With every new murder, he seems to be taunting her, cutting ever closer, from her hospital to her home. Her only comfort comes from Thomas Moore, the detective assigned to the case. But even Moore cannot protect Cordell from a brilliant hunter who somehow understands--and savors--the secret fears of every woman he kills.
Story
A stranger roams the streets of Boston and brutally kills young women. Women who at first glance don´t seem to have anything in common. But the more Jane Rizzoli deals with the bestial murders, the more she becomes convinced that something connected these three young women with each other. And while she works with her ingenuity and ambition to track down the “surgeon”, the doctor Dr. Catherine Cordell is experiencing hell on earth again. It seems like a dead man has risen and wants to give her a present with his murders. A particularly cruel gift. 

Style
Bloody and gripping, captivating and exciting to the end, Tess Gerritsen wrote the first volume of her world-famous series about Jane Rizzoli and Maura Isles. In my opinion the bloodiest and most brutal book in this series. But always with level and style. The author describes technical things so vividly and yet fascinatingly, it was a pure pleasure to imagine them pictorially and to read more and more through the thriller. A real page-turner.

Characters
Her characters are very varied and profound. Even evil is packaged in a fascinating way and immensely captivating, even if it increasingly repels you when you read it. Jane Rizzoli´s struggle against her male colleagues and against herself is extremely interesting and formulated with a dash of sarcasm and made me smile at times. To experience her in addition to the outwardly perfect beauty of Catherine was really a pleasure in itself. One is on the side of the law and carries messiness and chaos as a middle name. the other is in the service of humanity and literally makes decisions about life and death and needs absolute control in her life. Internally and externally. Tess Gerritsen could not have created two more opposing characters. 


Conclusion
Pure thrill! A brilliant start to a terrific thriller series. Nothing for weak nerves. The plot is absolutely brilliant and the way how Tess Gerritsen brought her figures and story to life is absolutely unique. For me one of her best books at all. 



Happy reading







Tess Gerritsen
Tess Gerritsen ©Derek Henthorn

New York Times bestselling author Tess Gerritsen earned international acclaim for her first novel of suspense, Harvest. She introduced Detective Jane Rizzoli in The Surgeon (2001) and Dr. Maura Isles in The Apprentice (2002) and has gone on to write numerous other titles in the celebrated Rizzoli & Isles series. A physician, Tess Gerritsen lives in Maine.

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