Silent Mercy

Another brisk and bouncy outing with New York prosecutor Alex Cooper, with all the earmarks of this long-running series -- a crazed mass killer, a tour of one segment of New York history, and a violent ending in which Alex is in dreadful peril somewhere cold and dark. This time, the killer's mania is religious. Several of the crime scenes are religious institutions, and Ms. Fairstein scatters a good bit of information on various religious groups. Also, her strong feminist views come through, which is interesting in the religious context. One reason I keep reading these is because I am a New Yorker, and I like local info. Another is that I keep waiting for Alex to dump the latest in her series of improbable boyfriends and focus on ----- show more .. But no spoiler, and not yet show less

Alex Cooper, Asst. DA for Special Crimes, finds herself, in this 13th installment of the series, taking on the religious fanatic who is against the ordination of women whether as priests, ministers, or rabbis and is methodically killing the pariahs of the religious sects - women priest who have been silenced, teaching ministers on the path to higher positions. The background history of the NY City buildings, a staple of the Alex Cooper mysteries, takes the reader from a former synagogue converted to a Baptist Church in Harlem all the way to a island leper colony. We also see the characters especially Mike Chapman (Irish Catholic) and Alex Cooper (Christian/Jewish background) as our symbols of pro and con for the inclusion of women in show more the religious sects.

In counter balance we see Alex standing firm against prosecuting a teenage boy for rape when it was obvious that the sex for the two teenagers was consensual as well as instigated by the young woman. Alex will not bend under pressure to expel the young boy simply because the girl doesn't want to be confronted by her previous partner at school and her parents have some political influence.

Some readers seem to think that Ms Fairstein is running out of originality, but I am not of that opinion. I look forward to the next installment just as much as I did the previous ones. show less

Eh. The thirteenth book in the Alex Cooper series and it sorta shows. It wasn't a badly written book of course. Fairstein writes very well and her mysteries are generally well plotted and in this story, unlike the last one, the 'chock full of historical' facts that were on every page weren't quite as intrusive.

As usual it starts with a murder, and not exactly a usual one. Alex, Mercer and Mike get to collaborate on it as it gets more and more about religions and women.

There was also a tiny little subplot about a teen girl and her family and whether or not she had been raped and how her family was dealing with it. But it was done very superficially and in the background compared to the main plot. It seemed interesting though and I wish show more it had been explored more.

I also wish that the book didn't seem so mean spirited to me. I understand that Alex and Mike are friends that poke and prod and kid with each other, but as the reader I don't find a lot of it funny. Not to mention Fairstein either needs to get Alex and Mike together, or get them apart, the in between has worn thin. show less

The latest in the Alexandra Cooper series, this book started with a burnt body being discovered on the steps of a church. The church is behind a tall, locked gate, and the church itself is locked. How did the body get there? Cooper, her close friends and police officers Mercer and Chapman, begin investigating this murder when another burnt body at a neighbouring church shows up.

Meanwhile, Cooper is attending to her daily duties as the chief of the Sex Crimes division of the District Attorney's office of New York City. In this book, it means stepping into a volatile trial involving a defrocked priest accused of improper behaviour with a student, and then handling a sticky situation with the family of a student who may have exaggerated a show more rape claim.

The things I like about Fairstein's books were still here - great chemistry between the Cooper and her two main friends, Mercer and Chapman. As usual, I like seeing a strong female character in fiction who is also capable of having friendships with men (read: she isn't seen as a "ballbuster" or a bitch to be steered clear of).

The things that I dislike, though, are still there, which is why Fairstein has been relegated to library-status. She repeats certain details in every book that really don't need to be there. Even if this was my first book, I don't NEED to know that she is wealthy because her father invented a diddly-do that was once used in every heart surgery way back when. Or that Chapman became a policeman because his father blah blah blah. I also read these stories for the great plotlines, the suspense, and the trial scenes. If I wanted lessons on New York City history and architecture, I could take classes or get entire books on those. And enough on lecturing me about how a woman or girl dresses doesn't mean she deserved to be raped. While I understand that Fairstein probably DID need to educate policemen and juries on this point in her actual job before she became a novelist, she doesn't need to use her fiction books to educate her readers. Or, if she wants to, find a better way to do it. At this point, I can usually spot the lecture coming and just skip the next page. It's tedious. show less

Another installment of Alexander Cooper, assistant DA for the sex crimes unit of NYPD. I like the fact that Fairstein puts so much history of New York in her books. I have learned so much about the city through this series. However, I think she made a significant mistake in this book because her killer is not a local and would not know the history that allows Alex and the detectives to figure out who he is. While the identity of the killer is interesting, it did not blend with the rest of the plot and was not believable at all. I feel like Fairstein either started this without knowing who her killer was or made a sea change mid-way through. I'd also like to see her shake up Alex's world a bit. Too much of the same is coming through in show more each book; lots of expensive booze, deferential restaurant owners, and the same shenanigans from her office nemesis. I'd like a surprise now and again. show less

Linda Fairstein is one of handful of writers with series that I enjoy enough to always read whatever the latest is. It's a relatively select group that provides me with great reading comfort food and sometimes that's just what you need. I have a lot of respect for Linda Fairstein and her pioneering work as a Sex Crimes DA back in the days when the victim deserved it. As bad as it is now, it is much much better than it used to be and women like Linda Fairstein helped make that happen. Bonus that she writes good crime fiction.

All of that said it's feeling like she's running out of steam in this series. I still enjoyed it, particularly due to her penchant for teaching about the history and architecture of New York, but she's starting to show more head into Patricia Cornwell territory and that means I'll stop reading her at some point. Both this book and the last one were pretty annoying. Her books have great secondary characters, including her detective friends Mercer and Mike, but she's pretty much doing nothing for these characters. It's great that Alexandra is one of the guys, but for two books now Mercer has played little role and Mike is just so snarky that I don't know why anyone would stay around - and yet Alexandra always has an excuse for him. There's subtle victimization in the relationship that makes me really uncomfortable given the context.

I think I'll read one more of her books and if there isn't huge improvement, we'll part ways. show less

Alex, Mike and Mercer tackle an interesting case that they believe is tied to priest pedophilia but does have a religious zealot leaving religious leaders bodies on church steps and altars. Very suspenseful ending after boarding a train to catch the killer and ending up on a deserted lepher coloney island off of Cape Cod.