Long Lost by Harlan Coben and Until It's Over by Nicci French

And so, in an effort to clean up my database and get you to read more titles, I will be reviewing two at a time for a few weeks.

The first for this week is by one of my favorite authors. The second is by a husband and wife team of authors.

Long Lost by Harlan CobenLet me begin by saying “I’ve changed my mind” about Coben’s Myron Bolitar. I have read most of Mr. Coben’s books and up to this point in time was not particularly impressed with one of his early “Myron Bolitar” books. However, after reading Long Lost, I’m really ready to go back and read them all.

This story is about frozen embryos, terrorists, a “long lost” love affair, friendship, good police work and an interesting plot. The setting is New York, Paris and London and some very mysterious places in between.

Myron receives a phone call from a previous lover asking him to come to Paris. When he arrives he discovers her ex has been murdered under mysterious circumstances and some DNA discovered at the scene indicates a connection with an offspring who died in a car accident many years before.

As is usual in this author’s style, this story is fast-paced. It keeps you on the edge of your seat and encourages you to read it to the end. To me, this is what great writing is all about. When you come to the end of the story and discover what all the threads lead to, the story becomes plausible and scary at the same time.

Although initially disappointed that this was not a “stand alone” mystery but a revisiting of Bolitar, I was far from unhappy once I got into it. If you’ve liked his previous books such as “Promise Me”, “Hold Tight” and “The Woods”, you must add this to the list.

Ladybookbug!

Until It’s Over by Nicci French

Another new author for me, this was an okay title. The author is actually a husband and wife writing team. This book is in two parts. The first part is all about the crimes that were committed beginning in a tight-knit community on Maitland Road. As time goes by, the police are able to determine a common denominator and the reader thinks they have found the perpetrator.

The story continues in part two being related by the perpetrator of the crimes who fills in all the blank spaces.

I was a bit put off by some of the English “slang” in the book. Having read my share of English mysteries, I was able to figure out what they were talking about for the most part.

I might read another one of the books by this author, but then again maybe not.

Ladybookbug!