lyoness913's Full Review: James Patterson - Roses Are Red
Going home for Christmas means needing a break from family. There is a reason that some people choose to move away from their parents. Like Jerry Seinfeld would say "I need a buffer zone." Home this year with nothing to read led me to pick up a paperback that was stuck in a box some place. It was by author James Patterson.
I have seen hundreds of his hardback novels in bookstores marked down on the 'Extra Cheap Aisle' to $3.99, $4.99. I know they are popular because it seems as though he comes up with a new book every week. I think they only stay in hardcover for about 2 days and then the shelves are filled with the paperback versions. OK, maybe I am exaggerating.
I decided to see what all of the fuss was about. I sat down on the chair in the living room and opened the book, and my mother said "Summer, try THIS one instead, it's NEW, you can tell me whether or not I should read it." So, instead of beginning with Roses are Red, I started with a book called Cradle and All. Needless to say, Cradle and All is not what this review is about so all I will say is that it's about the ever-boring and overused Satan Spawn/Satanic Child cliche. I hated it. Upon telling my mother this, of course she had to convince me to read Roses Are Red, promising that it was great and his normal stuff.
The Book 'Roses Are Red'
Roses Are Red is about a serial killer who dubs himself The Mastermind. This perverse killer is into duping big corporations, especially banks. He is self obsessed of course, sick and twisted, evil, selfish...everything a typical serial killer usually is. He is smarter than everyone in the Universe and police and FBI are just perplexed as to what he'll do next and why he's done what he's done. He is..master of his own domain. Patterson even throws in a couple of necrophiliac scenes to shock the reader, and of course, robbers wearing Bill Clinton masks. (How many times and in how many movies/books are robbers going to do this??)
Anyway, the book's premise is that The Mastermind must be found before he does anything else shocking and weird and horrid. Detective Alex Cross, his new love interest Betsy Cavalierre are faithfully searching for the killer while they fall in bed together, regardless of his feelings for his ex-girlfriend Christine, who is in a state of mental breakdown because of some old case and because Alex won't quit being a cop. Cliche, cliche, cliche.
Patterson mechanically throws in a human interest story, as his daughter must have brain surgery to survive. Tearing Cross away from his most important police work to spend a few days with his daughter is hardly touching. It's a needless sub-plot.
Will Detective Cross and new love interest get their man? Of course they will. And the killer's true identity is....overly stupid.
The Characters
Detective Alex Cross
The main character in this novel is Detective Alex Cross. It is obvious that Patterson has written about Detective Cross in past books because his character is already well developed. I do not think that someone would have to read all past books on Cross, because without ever reading a prelude I knew that:
a) His wife had been murdered previously.
b) He had two kids by the dead wife and another kid (Little Alex) by a woman who he was previously involved with in some Weasel book, (My mind flashes back to the cheap aisle at the book store, constantly being glared at by the hardcover Pop Goes the Weasel
c) He was hurt because his girlfriend who was mother to Little Alex was still afraid of this Weasel guy, and wanted nothing to do with police or him, and she was going nuts.
d) He had been in countless murder/mystery crimes before solving serial killer crimes.
This is all you really have to know about Alex Cross, other than he's a bit sappy and refuses to go to bed on the first date.
Detective Betsy Cavalierre
Betsy is described as Cross' superior, but we all know this is done to satisfy some obligation Patterson feels to not appear chauvanist. Betsy is a character added to attempt to enrich the story (which gets pretty gruesome), with a love interest. From what I can see, the woman probably wouldn't be liked by Patterson's loyal fans because they already love his latest girlfriend, who wants nothing to do with him anymore. Betsy is perfect and every man's dream. She instigates sex and 'holds Cross' when he 'just wants to be held.' She is boring and predictable in her personal and professional life.
The Mastermind
The Mastermind is the killer and of course, Patterson leads the reader to believe it could be one of several people. He spends half the novel giving the qualifications of two individuals who fit the bill, who are of course not the 'real' Mastermind. The Mastermind is the most clever villain that Cross has ever seen and he must be stopped!! He is to be feared by women, men, children, and dead people!
The Bottom Line
Roses Are Red is predictable and even insulting to a reader's literary palate. Patterson's writing style in general consists of 4, 5, 6 paragraph chapters. His paperbacks are filled with empty pages which make for more than half of his stories.
Roses Are Red is his usual kind of novel. The depth of the story sits on the surface of the pages as the plot of a stupid murder/mystery unravels without any demand for thought from the reader. The Patterson novels I've read have been likely better consumed in front of a television during the commercials or on a stand in front of a treadmill.
Alex Cross is predictable and laughable. His new girlfriend is a ridiculous stereotype and The Mastermind is every cliche in every murder/mystery novel come to life on half-pages in tiny chapters. On that note, I fail to see how anyone can possibly fathom making a novel that has teeth and jaws and heart, in 150 chapters on 300 pages of paper. It can't be done.
The ending of the book of course reveals the shocking true identity of The Mastermind. It was a character so insignificant and senseless that I had to go back and look for what that person did for a living and how he knew Cross.
Roses are Red is mind-candy at best. At the risk of my brain turning to mush, I think I'll stay away from James Patterson.
From the Publisher: From James Patterson, the #1 bestselling author of Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider, comes a dazzlingly frightening new thri...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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