Tell No One (2001)

Well, that was exciting.
A thriller with some internet / email twists.
Winston heard about this on NPR and read it - sitting on the hill in Michigan.
Of course, I had to read it too.
A page turner and we liked it.
Read in 2004. ( )

Rating: 4 of 5

A suspenseful, action-packed mystery. I didn't want to put it down. ( )

Great story, not great writing. One of those rare cases where the movie is better than the book. (The movie is fantastic.) ( )

This is a solid 3 for the book but extremely frustrating in Kindle format because of the huge number of formatting and spelling errors. Yikes!

I truly didn't see the ending coming though I'm not sure if I really believed it. Beck's character didn't seem to have the motivation to kill (because he didn't know about Elizabeth's abuse) or the regret that I assume someone would have who ended a life. Also, I find it a little far-fetched that Beck wouldn't realize that his/his wife's beating, her disappearance, and the entire mess than ensued had EVERYTHING to do with the earlier events. He doesn't seem to come to that realization until way too late in the story. In addition, I don't believe that the characters would not have shared some of their information. Why wouldn't Linda tell her brother about the abuse pictures? Her loyalties would seemingly lie more with her brother than with her deceased sister-in-law. Especially after the two bodies were found and foul play became more plausible.

One thing I really enjoyed was the Tyrese storyline. I liked the interactions between Beck and him and the trust that each character had in the other. Though Tyrese is certainly not the most moral of characters, I found myself rooting for his people to kill Scopes' men and get Beck out of dicey situations.

I thought this book was thrilling and it definitely kept me guessing until the end. I bought this in a double-book pack for Kindle and I am really excited to read more by this author!

**It is always awkward for me to read a book where there is a character named Flannery. I'm sure other people have this problem more often but I really don't enjoy it--especially when the character is a quasi-sleazy lawyer! ( )

Eight years ago David Beck and his wife Elizabeth took their annual trip to the remote place where they had shared their first kiss. That night Beck was beaten and his wife kidnapped. She was found dead several days later, apparently the victim of a serial killer. Beck has since put some semblance of a life back together but it quickly unravels when he starts to receive messages that appear to be from his supposedly dead wife at the same time as two bodies are found in the spot where Elizabeth was kidnapped from. As Beck tries to determine if his wife might be alive after all, the authorities become convinced it was Beck not the serial killer who was responsible for her death and some nefarious characters who seem to know what really happened eight years ago take whatever action is necessary to ensure no one else finds out the truth.

I know it’s an over-used phrase but this book was, for me, a genuine page turner. Sure there are coincidences and plot contrivances to be found but I still read the book as quickly as I physically could, sneaking a few pages whenever I had a spare moment. The original premise hooked me immediately and the story, although far-fetched, sustained its internal logic throughout. There were multiple switches in point of view from first person (Beck’s) to third (virtually everyone else’s at one point or another) which helped give the frantic sense that lots of action was taking place simultaneously.

While the yarn was enjoyable unfortunately the characters were a little too predictable and trite for me to really connect with. Beck is so full of wholesome goodness (he’s a white doctor in a ghetto neighbourhood who never judges anyone not even the pregnant 12-year olds and is still in love with his dead high school sweetheart and is even kind to puppy dogs….) that if I met him in real life I’d want to beat him myself. Almost all of the rest of the characters are stereotypes too: the drug dealer with a heart of gold who helps Beck to go on the run and the evil generic Asian who has seen too much and can kill a man with his bare hands and so on. About the only character who I was really interested in as a person rather than a plot device was Beck’s best friend Shauna the plus size model who “stalks into a room as though it offends her”.

However, in a thriller more than almost any other genre plot is king and I can’t go past the fact that the book kept me interested from the first page to the last. ( )