Donato Carrisi

4.5./5
Donato Carrisi es un escritor fuera de serie, tiene una enorme capacidad de atraparte, de contar historias de tal manera que es imposible soltar un libro una vez que lo empiezas y en este caso en particular me ha mostrado un poco más de un personaje tan peculiar como diferente en este género, su protagonista no es para nada común.

Marcus es un cazador del tribunal de las almas, un hombre atormentado por un pasado desconocido y sin un futuro real, su única misión en la vida es show more perseguir el mal y en esta entrega se encuentra con ese mal de frente y le quita de su vida lo poco que tiene.

Es brutal, no hay otra manera de describirlo, la historia, la forma de contarlo, sus personajes, los asesinatos, las razones, las motivaciones, todo va enmarcado en un estilo genial y atrapante. Nunca sabes por dónde te va a salir con un estallido de genialidad, con una sorpresa, con algo inesperado y desvelando un poco más de ese pasado de Marcus que conocemos poco y él todavía menos.

Es verdad que Carrisi me ha quedado a deber, en la entrega pasada quedaron algunos temas sin resolver que esperaba que me los explicara en esta entrega y no fue así, sí que es verdad que el libro es tan bueno que tampoco extrañé mucho los personajes de la primera entrega, también es verdad que soy una curiosa y que necesito que me den explicaciones, tal vez sean innecesarias puesto que lo importante está dicho, pero aun así...

Pues nada, que recomendar esta serie es quedarme corta, para los amantes del género es un indispensable y es necesario leerse los libros en orden sin saltarse ninguno porque la vida de Marcus es tan importante como los casos que se investigan.

A por el tercero que salió recientemente. show less

The Whisperer by Donato Carrisi
4 Stars

What's It About?
Six severed arms are discovered, arranged in a mysterious circle and buried in a clearing in the woods. Five of them appear to belong to missing girls between the ages of eight and eighteen. The sixth is yet to be identified. Worse still, the girls' bodies, alive or dead, are nowhere to be found.

What Did I Think?
This was a hard one for me to rate. The story line and the plot were intriguing and very well written.. At other times it seemed show more that much of the writing was simply to fill space. Overall there was enough of the mystery of the missing girls and the journey through the killer's evil, complex mind to more than hold my interest and anticipation and earn the book 4 stars. I do wish the author had given the reader a better understanding of the location in the world that the story was taking place. I like to imagine where I am visiting as I read. A small thing and takes nothing away from an excellent read. show less

Don't let the title fool you. Yes, Rome is missing some girls & it's the search for their killer that brings together a disparate set of characters. But this is a book about evil....how we define it & how we react to it.
Say you had a loved on who was murdered & the killer was never caught. You are given the chance to decide their fate. Would you choose justice or revenge? Remain a victim or become an executioner?
This is just one of the thorny issues the characters of this complex novel have show more to wrestle with. It can be read as a straight up thriller but on another level it is a study of human nature, the choices we make & how we rationalize them.
It's a difficult book to summarize for a few reasons & after the first 130 pages or so, I was wishing I'd kept notes. There is a large cast & 5-6 seemingly unrelated plot lines that are set in different frames.
Sandra Vega is a forensic photographer/cop in Milan. Her husband, a journalist, died 5 months ago after falling on a construction site. She's having trouble moving on & hasn't even picked up his belongings from the station. Then she gets a phone call from Schalber, an uber annoying Interpol agent that makes her question everything she thought she knew about her husband's death. After going through his bags, all indications point to Rome as the place she'll find answers.
Marcus is a mysterious man with a gift for reading crime scenes. It's ironic that he can crawl around the mind of a killer because he doesn't even know who he is. After taking a bullet to the brain a while back, he has amnesia. Every night he relives the experience that altered his life & resulted in the death of this friend Devok. Each morning he remembers one additional detail & he wonders what he'll do if he ever recovers the face of the shooter. Will he turn him in or avenge his friend? Pretty weighty stuff, especially if you're a priest.
By day, he works with Clemente, the man who nursed him back to health. They investigate violent crimes that have gone unsolved & as the book opens, they're searching for a missing young woman who may be the latest victim of a serial killer who has evaded police.
There are other related cold cases & they discover a pattern, Someone is contacting people affected by the murders & letting them know who did it, giving them a choice....justice or retribution?
In separate passages throughout the book, we meet a man referred to as "the hunter". His story begins the previous year & as it progresses, we follow him as he searches for a serial killer from Paris to Mexico City, Kiev & finally a small town near Chernobyl. His identity is not revealed 'til the final pages & it's a revelation that throws a completely different spin on the rest of the book.
Each plot line is intriguing in itself but gradually the author begins to weave them all together. The characters cross paths & become involved in the others' search, affecting the outcomes. All of a sudden, you realize each story is part of a bigger picture & some of these people are not who they claim to be. Red herrings run amok & the author uses subtle misdirection that ensures your jaw will drop when twists are revealed. At one point, I thought everything was coming together then noticed I still had half the book to go.
There are many peripheral characters, some in passing, others with larger roles. But the main two are Sandra & Marcus, both of whom will be profoundly affected by what they learn.
I really enjoyed this. I could be picky & say there are moments when you have to suspend your disbelief & minor errors in medical procedures. Also, I found the dialogue a bit stilted in places but this may be due to blips in translation. But it did just what a great thriller should do....kept me turning the pages to see how it all shook out & didn't hand deliver the answers.
The ending left me wanting more of one character in particular & I would definitely pick up a sequel. All in all, an absorbing, intelligent & intricately plotted novel full of suspense & situations that make you think. show less

Non sono una che solitamente legge thriller, sopratutto thriller italiani. Carrisi è stato il primo, e spero che questo libro sia il primo di una lunga serie di thriller italiani che andrò a leggere. La penna di Carrisi l'ho trovata estremamente scorrevole, facile da leggere, mi sono divorata il libro in meno di un giorno. E ammetto che in un paio di occasioni mi è venuta la pelle d'oca da quanto mi ero immersa nella storia, era come se stessi anch'io nello studio del dottor Gerber ad show more ascoltare la storia di Hanna Hall.

Gerber personaggio affascinante, e ho amato il fatto che quasi tutti i personaggi presentati non hanno avuto solo una apparizione ma molte, cosa non esattamente comune dato che molti autori tendono ad introdurre personaggi all'interno di una storia per poi non farceli più vedere. Ogni personaggio l'ho trovato reale, altra cose per me alquanto rara da trovare in un libro.

Unica pecca è il finale. Io volevo delle risposte che però alla fine non sono arrivate. Anzi, per essere precisi, io volevo una solo risposta riguardo questo libro - risposta che però non ci è stata data. Ed è anche il motivo per cui non metto 5 stelle ma 4.

Leggerò il sequel? Si. Non so quando, ma sì. show less