Saturday 14 April 2012

Flash and Bones by Kathy Reichs

Title: Flash and Bones
Author: Kathy Reichs
Pages: 304
Genre: Crime
Published: 2011
Rating: Two out of Five

SYNOPSIS:
Kathy Reichs--#1 "New York Times "bestselling author and producer of the FOX television hit "Bones"--returns with a riveting new novel set in Charlotte, North Carolina, featuring America's favorite forensic anthropologist, Dr. Temperance Brennan.

Just as 200,000 fans are pouring into town for Race Week, a body is found in a barrel of asphalt next to the Charlotte Motor Speedway. The next day, a NASCAR crew member comes to Temperance Brennan's office at the Mecklenburg County Medical Examiner to share a devastating story. Twelve years earlier, Wayne Gamble's sister, Cindi, then a high school senior and aspiring racer, disappeared along with her boyfriend, Cale Lovette. Lovette kept company with a group of right-wing extremists known as the Patriot Posse. Could the body be Cindi's? Or Cale's?

At the time of their disappearance, the FBI joined the investigation, only to terminate it weeks later. Was there a cover-up? As Tempe juggles multiple theories, the discovery of a strange, deadly substance in the barrel alongside the body throws everything into question. Then an employee of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention goes missing during Race Week. Tempe can't overlook the coincidence. Was this man using his lab chemicals for murder? Or is the explanation even more sinister? What other secrets lurk behind the festive veneer of Race Week?

A turbocharged story of secrets and murder unfolds in this, the fourteenth thrilling novel in Reichs's "cleverly plotted and expertly maintained series" ("The New York Times Book Review"). With the smash hit "Bones "about to enter its seventh season and in full syndication--and her most recent novel, "Spider Bones, "an instant "New York Times "bestseller--Kathy Reichs is at the top of her game.




VERDICT:
I've been a fan of the Temperance Brennan series for about six or seven years now. I've read all fourteen novels in the series and this book was the worst one yet. I loved most of the books that Kathy Reichs has written. They are usually well written but this one was something of a letdown. The author only writes one book per year. Every year I wait in anticipation for the new novel but for the first time it really wasn't worth the wait!

Flash and Bones is contrived, repetitious and extremely dull. I was left feeling frustrated and disenchanted by this novel. The plot was slow, flat and predictable and the characters were one-dimensional and boring. I guessed correctly who the killer was 30% into the novel which is something I'm not normally able to do with this authors other books but this one lacks the twists and turns the other books have.

It seems like the author had writer's block while writing this novel and just wrote any old crap down just for the sake of having something to give to her publisher at the end of her deadline. I have a feeling that the author was also getting paid to advertise stuff in her novel. There are countless adverts for Youtube, iPhones, Pepsi, Coca-Cola, Poptarts, Pringles, Pampers and other products throughout the novel.

I like the personal relationship between Andrew Ryan and Temperance Brennan, which was missing from this book. Ryan only appears once or twice in the form of phone calls and emails. This novel was also lacking the forensic science which is what makes this series more unique than all the other crime series out there.

What hurts the most about this novel, is how Kathy Reichs has turned the character of Temperance Brennan from a brave, strong, capable, intelligent woman into a incompetent, indecisive, weak, horny nymphomaniac. The character really deserves much better than that! I mean, what was the deal with Galimore? Really Kathy? What the hell where you thinking girl?

Two stars!

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