The Bone Collector by Jeffery Deaver
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Stunningly realised work that both fascinates and repels in all the right places, with a protagonist– quadriplegic former police officer Lincoln Rhyme– who is among the most immediately fascinating and layered characters I’ve ever read in a crime novel. The characters are well rounded and play off each other superbly, with distinct and discrete voices– Rhyme’s assistant-come-antagonist Amelia Sachs is also beautifully realised and a fascinating character in her own right, something that can’t always be said for secondary characters in a novel of this type, and certainly not something that can always be said for female characters; the crimes are sufficiently shocking and contain an internal logic that makes them all the more riveting; and the counterplots that rumble along underneath the main narrative are taut and gripping in their own right. Let down only by a somewhat forced and slightly unbelievable double-climax which feels as the natural climax was added to in order to provide an additional moment of surprise, this is a rich, intense and gripping crime novel of the first water.
Lee Battersby 