The Empty Chair (2000)

Not bad, not bad at all. I do enjoy this series. I liked the setting of this one, in North Carolina. ( )

A quadriplegic since a beam crushed his spinal cord years ago, Rhyme is desperate to improve his condition and goes to the University of North Carolina Medical Center for high-risk experimental surgery. But he and Sachs have hardly settled in when the local authorities come calling. In a twenty-four-hour period, the sleepy Southern outpost of Tanner's Corner has seen a local teen murdered and two young women abducted. And Rhyme and Sachs are the best chance to find the girls alive. ( )

In the 1920’s through the 1950’s, most mystery writers that wrote long running series with the same hero in each of the novels did not do a lot of character development with their heroes. All of the books could be read in almost any order you wanted because the hero stayed pretty much the same. Agatha Christie’s Poroit or Miss Marple does not change much from the first novel until the last one. The same is true for Ross MacDonald’s Lew Archer or Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe. The modern mystery novelist is different in that the main character develops and changes from the first novel through out the series. In fact some of the best writing in these series is now the development that we watch the main character go through as the series progresses. From that perspective, The Empty Chair is quite good.

Lincoln Rhyme has gone to North Carolina to have a very risky operation done on his spinal cord. He is a quadriplegic and wants to take the risk that he may turn out in worse shape medically for the chance that he may get better. A great deal of his struggle is expressed though out the book as is his assistant/partner/lover’s dismay over the possible ramifications of this same surgery Lincoln wants to have performed. There is a secondary character, Lucy that develops thorough out the book as well. All of this is done well.

But the mystery/thriller part of the book is almost laughably ridiculous. The action in this book is driven by one of two things; 1) what appear to be very smart people do very stupid things, or 2) very dumb people do even stupider things. Raymond Chandler (I think) once said that if you are writing a mystery and you reach a place where you are stuck for what is to happen next, kill somebody. It is obvious that this author, Jeffery Deaver, has a corollary to that axiom – if you are stuck in your book, just have one of your characters do something really stupid – in fact....... the stupider.........the better. ( )

Keep you guessing until the last chapter....even the last page! That seems to be Jeffery Deaver's modus operandi. It works. Although I wasn't as taken with "The Empty Chair" as I have been with the first two books in this series, it was still an enjoyable book. I'll be picking up the next in the series for sure! No disappointment here. ( )

I have always made a habit of reading only one book per year by certain novelists. On that list include my favorite "treats"; Patricia Cornwall, Stephen King, John Grisham, Jonathan Kellerman ... just to name a few. I really enjoy the books by these authors, but reading too many of their in a short span can be like too much cheesecake. You can love the cheesecake, but one slice usually does the trick.

READ MORE at:

http://youarewhatyouread2.blogspot.com/2011/08/empty-chair-by-jeffery-deaver.htm... ( )