: Jack and Jill
Author: James Patterson
Interesting thriller about a plot to assassinate the president. Patterson lets us in on the killers’ perspectives early in the book, but doesn’t tell us their identity. This "tell, don’t tell" creates a sense of impatience that’s frustrating and artificial, but the book’s pacing is fast enough that it’s bearable. This book wasn’t as fast-paced as Cat and Mouse, the only other Patterson book I’ve read, but it got better as the book went along. I still think Patterson’s "great" detective, Alex Cross (who appears in many of his books), is boring; Patterson has made him so "everyman" that we see very little extraordinary. I prefer an outrageous character like Sherlock Holmes. We may not know every detail of his love life, but at least he’s brilliant. One thing Patterson does that I really like is that when he ends one chapter on a cliffhanger he picks up the action right where it left off in the next chapter. Most writers throw in chapters with alternate storylines in the middle which, besides being exasperating and confusing, often comes across as artificial. I haven’t read most of Patterson library, but I like quick-moving fiction — looks like I’ve got some reading to do.
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