Who Wanted Ed Dead?
Written: Oct 20 '02
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Unique plot, suspenseful, good characters
Cons: Nothing significant
The Bottom Line: This book has a unique and original plot that made it very readable
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| Rocketgirl's Full Review: Elizabeth Adler - In a Heartbeat |
I had never heard of Elizabeth Adler when I picked up this book. Now I want to go back and read her other novels and happily, there are are least 12 of them! Epinions classifies this book as suspense and romance. Don't confuse this with romantic suspense, which is where the romance is an end point of the story. That is definitely not the case here. Let me explain.
Ed Vincent is a self-made millionaire. One day as he gets off his jet, he is shot several times by an assassin. The shots don't kill him immediately, but put him in a coma. Homicide cop Marco Camelia is assigned to the case to try to find out who and why someone wanted to kill Ed.
Enter Melba Merrydew, Ed's lover. Melba vows to find out what happened, with the help of Camelia. She can't imagine who could want to kill Ed. It requires delving into his mysterious past, in which he escaped from a poor farm in the Appalachians.
Where the romance enters the picture is that Camelia finds himself falling for Melba, a crime victim who he is supposed to be helping. Also, he is a happily married man with four children. His strength of character keeps him from acting on his feelings, sparing his marriage, plus not taking advantage of the fact that her lover is in a coma. The sexual tension lends an added dimension to the overall mystery of trying to find Ed's killer.
The main story is set in New York, where Ed has his business. But the adventure takes Melba and Marco to Los Angeles, where Melba lives, to South Carolina and Tennesee when they research Ed's background. The descriptions of the locations are just enough to give you a flavor of where they are, but not too detailed. You definitely know you are in the south, or the west, or the northeast.
The book is heavy on dialogue, so moves along at a crisp pace. Most of the discussion advances the plot, but there is just enough to help the reader learn the motivation behind the characters. By the end you are not quite sure if you want Melba to be reunited with Ed or if you want Melba to go with Marco.
I was a little trepidatious that this would either be a mob story or a drug crime. I'm pretty tired of both types. I won't reveal what was going on, but will tell you it was something else besides organized crime or drug trafficking. I am glad the author used another motivation for crime besides those two biggies.
Another plot twist was that the author used a series of flashbacks both to help the reader understand the special relationship between Ed and Melba, but also to try to figure out what event from Ed's past could lead to an assassination attempt. Or is it someone from his past at all? Sometimes flashbacks get bogged down and last too long. Other times they are told in such a way you can't tell when it switches back to present again. Adler handled this technique very well.
Another facet of the book that it made it a quick read was that it changed points of view from chapter to chapter. This can be irritating if the point of view doesn't stay with one character for more than a page at a time, but that was not the case here. Also, though Ed can't move or speak, he can think, and occasionally the author throws in Ed's thoughts when Melba visits. The chapters themselves were also fairly short, which leads to turning pages quickly.
Other than the sexual tension, there is nothing else sexual in the book. There is so little profanity that I think I can count the number of swear words on one hand. A nice change. Though a book of this type will obviously have some violence, as justification for the following plot, there was little graphic description of it.
I really liked this book, one of few that I have been able to rate five stars lately. It seems like there is always something wrong. But other than a slightly anti-climactic ending, I found the book nearly perfect. I recommend it to those who enjoy suspense novels and murder mysteries. I am definitely going to look for other books by Elizabeth Adler.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
Rocketgirl
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Member: Beth
Location: Tri-Cities, WA
Reviews written: 398
Trusted by: 224 members
About Me:
So many books, so little time.
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