Reply To: Books I've Read

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The Cutting Edge (Lincoln Rhyme #14) byJeffery Deaver

When you pick up a Deaver penned book you pick up a text book. No, not one of those boring things you fought to keep your eyes open while reading for homework but one that’s a delight to learn from. As an example, in this book we learn about diamonds, the mining of them and the process of making them into the pretty baubles that cost oh so much. (I prefer the more brilliantly colored stones, emeralds, sapphires and especially rubies, but then they are my birthstone and the only precious stone I’ve ever owned.) We also learn a bit about earthquakes and the different types of vulnerability from the earth shaking on one coast to the other.

As an aside, I saw the movie The Bone Collector staring Denzel Washington as Lincoln Rhyme and Angelina Jolie as Amelia Sachs. I subsequently read the book and to this day I cannot read a book with Rhyme as a character without seeing him in the Washington incarnation. Not so Sachs. She’s so well described by Deaver that I see her as a fair skinned ginger, tall and fit save for her arthritis. But as I said, that’s an aside and not meant to influence your mental image of either Rhyme or Sachs.

Justin Patel is one of the best diamond cutters in New York City. Well, he was until he was killed in an apparent robbery. As were two of his customers who came to buy an engagement ring. Death did them part even before the wedding. And Patel’s part time employee walks in during the robbery and is shot. . . sort of. (Here it comes, my mantra, read the book to find out what that means.)

If you are familiar with Deaver’s Rhyme books, or his Kathryn Dance books, you know that little is as it seems. Twists and turns abound and there are more leaps for you to focus on than hurdles in a 400 meter hurdle race. (In case you’re wondering that’s 10 hurdles, the same as in a 100 or 110 meter race but you see my point.) Answers come quickly but then not all answers are correct. Why I remember once in an engineering course I was taking. . . but wait, that’s well beside the point.

Suffice to say that there are answers and red herrings. (I am not much of a fish eater but why are red herrings worse than, say, orange or purple herrings?) There is adventure and tragedy and success through adversity. A typical Jeffery Deaver book, and all well done.

And there’s an ending to this novel. Or is there? What does that mean? You guessed it, READ THE BOOK!

If you haven’t read a Deaver book and especially a Lincoln Rhyme themed one and you are a mystery/crime buff you have done yourself a disservice. If you are a Deaver fan and you haven’t read this book, what are you waiting on? It’s as good as any of them

". . . those who claim to know the Mind of God, who will tell you what God thinks and how He will judge and condemn others—those people are the greatest of all blasphemers." Aloysius Xingu Leng Pendergast