Tag: Harlan Coben

Gone Before Goodbye by by Reese Witherspoon and Harlan Coben, Book Review

~ Veselin ~ Leave a comment

I knew it will be a tough book to read because it had bad reviews. It wasn’t easy but wasn’t too bad either.

Alexander Belyaev has a story about a man who is essentially dead but his head is attached to a machine and is still talking. The head is waiting for a compatible headless body so it can be reattached. The story is called Professor Dowell’s Head. You would expect that Gone Before Goodbye is a crime mystery thriller, where we are trying to figure out what happened to the missing person (who’s gone). But it is, in reality, something similar to Belyaev’s stray head.

The book is very well written in most parts, and well translated too. The first 100 pages were excellent; then chaos set in. Maggie, a surgeon who lost her license, is offered redemption if she performs a difficult and illegal surgery. Once she accepts and sells her soul to the devil, people start flying around the globe like there’s no tomorrow and for no clear reason. Perhaps to show off how rich they are.

The resolution is like the head I mentioned. It’s sci-fi and ridiculous. We also have an avatar, living inside a phone, a common trope in present-day sci-fi. These AIs are usually demigods, who can do everything, and so is Maggie’s AI app. Also ridiculous.

Why three stars and not four, for example? Because it is never really clear why anything really happens. The book contains all kinds of cataclysmic and dramatic moments, and not a single one of them is actually necessary for the story. The explanation for everything is that a head is trying to find a body. Characters fly to Russia, billionaire balls are held, some people chase others, while committing grand acts of bravery without any relation to this problem. It’s not exactly a head but you’ll see if you read it. So I felt a disconnect between the great writing style, nice characters, the grandiose scenes, and setup, and the missing link to the actual story.

I could have given it two stars as well because of the publisher’s decision to compact the 350-page book into 300 pages by making the letters tiny and squeezing the letter spacing.

Despite the review, I enjoyed the individual fragments of good writing. 3/5 because of that.

Anniversary Harvest

~ Veselin ~ 3 Comments

I had a work anniversary a few days ago and rewarded myself with some new thrillers.

Left to right:

  • Killman Creek by Rachel Caine – a continuation of a very successful first part.
  • Gone Before Goodbye by Reese Weatherspoon and Harlan Coben. Bad Goodreads reviews on this one but I respect both authors and will give it a chance. Harlan Coben has been on a negative trend lately. I hope this collaboration gets him out of the slope.
  • Exit Strategy by Andrew and Lee Child. In Too Deep was a flop but I adjusted my expectations. I now imagine Jack Reacher as played by late-day Steven Seagal – arrogant, slow, and absurd. After reading a scene where Reacher defeated an armed opponent while tied to a table, I expect nothing less. Looking forward to seeing if he can beat an international conspiracy while sitting on a chair.

Think Twice by Harlan Coben, Book Review

~ Veselin ~ 5 Comments

Even the best thriller authors have bad days. There must’ve been a day when Harlan Coben decided to use the trope of the incredibly smart serial killer who chases our main protagonist by doing weird circles. This choice wasn’t great.

The killer manages to be very successful with a variety of strangers and then turns silly in the presence of Myron Bolitar. Meanwhile our superheroes talk and talk. And talk.

Think Twice was a miss for me. It’s readable but I had a very good idea what will happen and it mostly happened. I hope the next book is better. Harlan Coben doesn’t have many bad books, he’s usually consistently good.

2*/5