Book Review: Blowout

Reviewed By: Webspinner - RAM

[4 stars]

Blowout Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
Catherine Coulter
Class/Genre: Mystery FBI Police Procedural Government Agency Serial Killer
Series: Lacey Sherlock & Dillon Savich # 9
Penguin; 2004; 356pp

Agents Dillon Savich and Lacey Sherlock are both FBI agents, married to each other, with a young son, and work together on the same 'team'. [I didn't think the FBI allowed that?] While on vacation, fixing a flat tire on a lonely road at night, a terrified young woman begs him for help with the man trying to kill her. He takes her home, but the house (ablaze with lights) is empty . . . and the woman disappears. When Savich and Sherlock demand that the local sheriff investigate, they find out the woman died 30 years ago.

While still reeling from trying to figure out what is going on, the two are called back to Washington by helicopter when a Supreme Court justice is murdered within the library of the Supreme Court itself. Tensions are high and they only get worse with jurisdictional rivalries and the involvement of the Justice's step-daughter, a local reporter. Was the killing personal? Was it related to the Justice's prior rulings? Or is the entire Court in danger. The second killing ramps things up even higher. And Savich is still being visited and dreaming about the woman in the Poconos.

This one was a page-turner. Even with a couple of slightly unlikely plot points, _Blow Out_ kept me interested and reading, even late into the night, with twists and turns. Right up to the last 30 pages, and that's where it fell apart for me. I 'suspended disbelief' about a few things for the sake of a good story and bought into the storyline until that point. The serial killer's motivations and the final denouement just didn't work for me at all, and after a quite good read, that was disappointing. It won't, however, keep me from picking up copies of earlier books in the series or reading the next one.

Webspinner - RAM

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Webspinner - RAM