Well, it was certainly better than the movie...but not by nearly as comfortable a margin as I would have expected. What's surprising is just how far-fetched and borderline ridiculous so much of this novel is. Despite the fact that author Jeffery Deaver obviously did his research down to the slightest detail, very little of the plot comes across as even remotely believable. The last fifty pages made my eyes hurt from rolling them so much. My favorite thing about THE BONE COLLECTOR is that the main detective character is quadriplegic--a very creative notion and certainly a first for the genre. But Deaver ruins it by somehow managing to make him completely unsympathetic despite his handicap. He also grants him such a vast array of collected knowledge and superhuman powers of deduction that he could probably out-fox Sherlock Holmes. And when you invent a character who can solve crimes better than Sherlock Holmes, that's when you know you went too far. And if you think that his being a quadriplegic jackass will stop him from getting the girl in the end...well, just you wait and see. THE BONE COLLECTOR was entertaining (though way too CSI-heavy for my taste), but its cheesy dialog and overall implausibility make me more likely to dump my ragged, old copy in the wastebasket rather than give it away to one of my friends or coworkers.

Il libro verte su un arco di tempo che va dalle 22.30 di venerdì alle 22.00 di lunedì. Sono quasi quarantott’ ore in cui succede di tutto!
Sei persone tra morti e rapiti:T. J. Colfax e Tammie Jean, Monelle Gerger, William Everett, la ragazza che faceva jogging, Carole Ganz e Pammye pure Amelia Sachs.
Innamoramenti.
Corse in auto all’ americana con tanto di incidente colpendo la solita sfortunata edicola.
Indagini a manetta.
Scoperta dell’ assassino.
A trovargli un pregio direi che ispiri alla prima parola ed espiri all’ ultima pagina.
A trovargli un difetto direi che a me i superuomini, superintelligentoni, arroganti non sono mai piaciuti.
Anche fin troppo “cinematografico”, ma si fa leggere. Eccome!

5 sao

Một cuốn truyện trinh thám tuyệt vời!

Cuốn sách này sẽ làm thỏa mãn những ai yêu thích tính trí tuệ, suy luận, tỉ mỉ nhưng còn ngại cái không gian bức bối, khép kín của trinh thám cổ điển. Và cũng sẽ làm hài lòng những ai say mê sự ly kỳ, mạo hiểm, những kỹ thuật mới lạ, tiên tiến của dòng trinh thám hiện đại, nhưng cũng đã chán sự khoa trương, chỉ mang bề nổi của dòng sách này.

Phải nói là có rất ít cuốn sách mà mình cảm thấy không chê chỗ nào được như quyển này. Hệ thống nhân vật của sách rất đa dạng, cùng không gian rộng mở, dù trớ trêu là nhân vật chính hầu như suốt quyển sách chỉ nằm tại phòng ngủ của mình. Tác giả có một kiến thức rất phong phú (dù mình không biết có chính xác hay không :p) về các tổ chức chuyên sâu điều tra tội phạm của chính phủ Mỹ, cùng cách tả những cảnh đang hoạt động của họ rất thú vị, làm mình có cảm giác đang là một người đứng tại đó quan sát vậy.

Còn về phần khám nghiệm hiện trường, nội dung chính trong việc điều tra, được mô tả rất chi tiết, đặc biệt là nhờ tình huống nhân vật "được" đưa đi khám nghiệm hoàn toàn không biết gì về chuyên môn, phải nhờ sự chỉ dẫn từ căn bản của Rhyme, cũng cho phép người đọc tiếp cận với lĩnh vực thú vị này từ những nguyên tắc căn bản nhất. Làm cho ta có cảm giác hào hứng đón nhận kiến thức mới này chứ không như những cuốn trinh thám khác, nhân vật chính lúc nào cũng diễn giải kiến thức một cách không tự nhiên và giáo điều. Và mình cũng rất bất ngờ khi cuốn sách đã ra mắt gần 20 năm, các kỹ thuật khám nghiệm hiện trường hay pháp y đã quá cũ so với tiến bộ hiện nay, nhưng khi đọc mình hoàn toàn không có cảm giác là nó lỗi thời, thậm chí các kỹ thuật lấy dấu tay cao cấp, quang sắc ký... đối với mình còn rất mới lạ. Lượng kiến thức của Rhyme, cũng là của tác giả, về lĩnh vực này thật l�� đáng nể. Nhưng yên tâm, như mình nói nó không mang tính khoe kiến thức lộ liễu kiểu như Dan Brown mà được thể hiện rất hợp lý, vừa phải, đúng lúc.

Điểm đặc sắc nhất của quyển sách này, không chỉ nằm ở các vụ án mà còn ở hệ thống nhân vật của nó. Rhyme là một nhân vật chính vô cùng đặc biệt, là kiểu nhân vật mà khi ta muốn tạo một nhân vật chính thật đặc biệt cho một cuốn truyện trinh thám thì chỉ có thể đến mức độ như Rhyme thôi. Chỉ còn có từ phần đốt sống cổ 4 trở lên, và an ủi là còn thêm ngón 4 bàn tay trái, là hoạt động được. Hay nói cách khác anh chỉ có mỗi bộ não của mình để đối phó với tên phản diện vô cùng xảo quyệt. Nhưng tác giả không chỉ tạo ra nhân vật như thế rồi thôi, ông còn cho ta thấy cuộc sống của anh nữa. Những bất tiện, đau khổ của Rhyme được thể hiện rất chân thực, từ những điều vụn vặt nhỏ nhoi đời thường cho đến cái sĩ diện tự ái lớn lao, khiến anh chỉ còn mỗi suy nghĩ là kết thúc cuộc sống của mình.

Và đó là tiền đề đưa đến một điểm hay của truyện: sự chuyển biến của nhân vật theo mạch truyện, điều mà không phải cuốn truyện trinh thám, vốn chỉ tập trung vào các tình tiết ly kỳ hấp dẫn, nào cũng làm được. Poirrot đầu truyện và cuối truyện vẫn là Poirrot mà ta biết, Jack Reacher cuối truyện này vẫn là Jack Reacher ở một truyện nào khác. Nhưng Rhyme ở cuối cuốn truyện này sẽ có những đổi khác so với Rhyme ở đầu truyện, dù biểu hiện bên ngoài có thể không thay đổi gì mấy. Tác giả còn lồng vào một số hình ảnh xung quanh căn phòng của Rhyme, cùng sự thay đổi giữa đầu và cuối truyện như để ẩn dụ cho nó. Tất nhiên mình cũng nghĩ đây là quyển sách đầu tiên, nhân vật chỉ mới được giới thiệu nên tác giả mới xây dựng một cốt truyện được như vậy, không biết những tập sau của serie còn có thể mang lại cảm nhận như vậy nữa không thì phải xem thêm vài cuốn khác mới biết được.

Một nhân vật nữa cũng có sự thay đổi lớn, đó là Amelia Sachs, một nhân vật nữ chính vô cùng ấn tượng, thậm chí còn có phần lấn át Rhyme, khi hầu hết các tình huống truyện đều có sự tham gia của cô. Mở đầu truyện cô cho mình một cảm giác không thật thích cho lắm, nhưng xuyên suốt câu chuyện cá tính thật sự của cô dần được bộc lộ ra, và chắc hẳn cô cũng sẽ bất ngờ trước những thay đổi của chính mình, tiếc là truyện không cho mình thấy cuộc sống sau đó của cô như thế nào.

Vì Rhyme là một nhân vật đặc biệt như vậy nên xung quanh anh còn có rất nhiều nhân vật giúp đỡ, và ai cũng được khắc họa rất sinh động, dễ mến, đọc đến cuối truyện rồi bạn sẽ thấy những nhân vật này thân thuộc như chính bạn bè của mình vậy. Mà cũng vì nhiều nhân vật, nhiều dữ kiện nên theo mình thấy đoạn đầu sách đọc hơi bị chậm, nhưng khi các nhân vật đã xuất hiện đầy đủ, cuộc đua bắt đầu thì sẽ khó mà dứt quyển sách ra được :).

I can't believe I haven't read anything by this author before - was I in a fugue? I read this as part of - The Lincoln Rhyme Collection books 1 - 4. Because I seen the movie first - a myriad of times - I couldn't help but visualise Denzel Washington and Angelina Jolie in their respective roles. Bad idea. In the book, Rhyme is Caucasian and Amelia Sachs' is a fiery redhead. So that took some getting used to.

There's a killer on the loose - and ex IRD (Investigation and Resource Division) head, Lincoln Rhyme (a C4 Quadriplegic), has two unwelcome visitors, Lon Sellitto and Jerry Banks, requesting his assistance on a case. Rhyme' is in a very dark place and has a date with Dr. Berger of the Lethe Society (death doctor) - and he's adamant that nothing is going to change his mind.

He gradually gets interested (though he still wants to die), and requests the officer who found the first victim, Amelia Sachs, be brought in - as she showed ingenuity - by sealing off the crime scene. Although, not everyone is impressed, when she stops the traffic, whilst the UN conference is in town.

The first two victims were passengers in a taxi, John Ulbercht and T.J. Colfax. Sachs' was the officer who found Ulbercht - and now it's a race against time to try and find/save the second kidnap victim, Tammie Jean Colfax. The killer leaves clues, so...it's just a case of deciphering what the unsub is telling them.

Rhyme' lives in a Gothic style townhouse on the Upper West Side of the city, overlooking Central Park - and his bedroom on the second floor, soon becomes the CP (Command Post) - which is bustling with activity. Thom, his aide, is designated the task of adding annotations to a poster, basically detailing what they know about Unsub 823 (Unknown Subject) - so far. Mel Cooper, turns Rhyme's bedroom into a mini lab, so he does a lot of tests on the samples collected by Sachs' from different crime scenes. The Hardy Boys, Bedding and Saul - do the canvassing, and they're skillful in interviewing people who live close to crime scenes - and Sachs' is Rhymes eyes and ears - and isn't too pleased about it; as she was supposed to be transferring to Public Affairs at noon, for a training session - and she's been waiting eight months for this reassignment.

I really enjoyed the book - though some of the authors/characters dialect was a bit antiquated. You've got words like: Limo'd, brother'd, whatta, myself'd, this's, offa (off of), figger (figure), grounds're, dincha (didn't you), he'd've, ever'body, to've, etc. So that took some getting used to, as well. There's a few acronyms throughout, though most of those are explained in the following sentence/paragraph via the author or character: COC ( Chain Of Custody), CI (Confidential Informant), ESU (Emergency Services Unit), PERT (Physical Evidence Response Team), ALS (Alternative Light Source.) The appendix at the end, explains some of them in more detail.

In summation: This was very good. I liked the forensic work, which was done in minute detail, at times, with Sachs' walking the grid: north/south - then perpendicular - east to west - looking for clues, in the hope of catching the killer, as well as finding the location of the next victim. There's a lot of humour and banter throughout, so that was quite amusing, too.

Another great Deaver novel. This was so much better than the movie was. So much more in depth, from the investigation itself to the personality of Lincoln Rhyme. So glad I decided to finally read it. I was not sure I would enjoy it as much as I enjoyed the Kathryn Dance series simply from the forensic aspect. I am more about the action side of mystery, but this one has plenty of action involved. The imagery of this story is amazing. I could not believe how visual it was for me.

So we have a serial killer called 'The Bone Collector', who is actually not a killer at all, but a planner that leads his victims to their death. He sets the victims up and lets life and nature naturally take it's course. He gives clues to the whereabouts of each victim and watches Rhyme and his team try to find them before the inevitable happens. Why the name? Because he loves bones.

All of the character's are created beautifully! Lincoln Rhyme is much more over the top in the book than he is in the movie. And this is not necessarily in a bad way. I am talking about his personality. Sometimes he really rubbed me the wrong way. But it also seemed to make him more real, more believable. He is a quadriplegic, unable to use any of his extremities, of course he would have a bad attitude and Deaver really developed him well.

I also look forward to watching Amelia grow through this series. She is a little hesitant at first in this book, but as I read through it she started to open up more and more and became a lot more confident and I loved that. I am not sure how much more she can grow but she is definitely one of my favorite characters and I think she will continue to be a force in this series.

This book has a great plot twist and even though I watched the movie there was a lot that I had forgotten about. So much more detail in the book. I could not put the book down till I was done. I look forward to the rest of this series! I recommend this book to anyone who likes a great story with lots of forensic elements and a lot of great mystery to solve.

TRIGGER WARNINGS FOR SUICIDAL REFERENCES IN THIS BOOK AND THROUGHOUT MY REVIEW.

This is the first instalment in the Lincoln Rhyme series.

Lincoln Rhymes was once a genius in the field of criminology, often finding tiny clues that others have overlooked and seeing each crime scene from his own, unique perspective. Now he wants to die. It has been three years since the accident that resulted in his incapacitated state and the burden of living his life beholden to others has become too much for him. Assisted suicide feels like his only future option, but he is urged to aid in the capture of one more criminal before the final deed is done.

This book was penned quite a few years ago and so there was the inclusion of a few lines that were in a tasteless or pointless style. These made me wince and served no purpose to the plot or in the creation of a character. The repeated references to the body size of one side-character was just one such instance and resulted in my four, instead of five, star rating.

This, however, was my only source of discontent within this blood-soaked and brutally-rendered storyline. It was as gripping as it was entertaining and I quickly became as plagued by the need to hunt down this serial killer as the police tasked to do just that. I believe that the multiple insights to his victims' suffering aided in aligning me so completely with Lincoln and his team, and also ensured it intimately delivered the horror of his actions.

I was unprepared for the criminal's perspective to feature, which also brought with it an abundance of harrowing and tragic scenes of torture from his own delighted viewpoint. But not even when those solving the case were left to examine the remains he left behind was the reader spared any of the intricate details about the horrors he inflicted . Deaver repeatedly brought each scene to harrowing and sickening vividity!

Asides from this being an entirely engrossing thriller, the two characters who centred it were provided with their own intriguing side-plots. Lincoln's emotional and physical struggles plagued him every single day and I thought Deaver handled these with sensitivity but also authenticity. Here, too, he did not shy away from presenting suffering with anything but the harsh glare of stark reality and, despite only having read one book from him, this feels like his signature style.

Amelia is the individual working underneath Lincoln and the one burdened with bearing his harsh retorts and acting out his hard demands. She was provided with her own personal character arc and I enjoyed seeing her blossom as she continued to come ever closer to both the man she sought and also the man who aided her in capturing him.

When a police officer finds a dead body buried, the NYPD goes to Ex-criminologist Lincoln Rhyme for help on who has been killing people and taking their bones. Will they find the killer in time before he strikes again? Read on and find out for yourself.

This was a pretty good police thriller that has a movie adaptation made of it too. If you like thrillers, be sure to check this book out at your local library and wherever books are sold.

“You work too hard. Amie, this case of yours ... it wasn’t dangerous, was it?
“I was just doing the technical stuff, Mom. Crime scene. It doesn’t get any safer than that.”

On her last day as a street cop, before moving to a desk job, Amelia Sachs is sent to investigate a reported murder near the train tracks in a derelict New York suburb. What she discovers there is definitely not for the squeamish, and very soon Amie will be engaged in one of the most urgent and most dangerous manhunts the metropolis has ever witnessed. Which makes her quaint remark on the phone to her mother rather funny. In the darkest shades of black available in print.

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This was my second in a row airplane read, after “To Catch a Thief” , and also my very first foray into Jeffery Deaver. I must say: I’m impressed! I went in with rather low expectations, as I prefer classic hardboiled or noir crime novels to the modern high octane offerings. I now believe Deaver is simply one of the best writers in the subgenre, based so far on my first encounter with his lead detective Lincoln Rhyme.

Something was nagging at Rhyme. An infuriating itch – the curse of all quads – though in this case it was an intellectual itch. The kind that had plagued Rhyme all his life.”

A quad is a quadriplegic patient, somebody who lost all muscle control bellow the neck. Rhyme, the former chief forensic expert on the New York police force, got his injuries in the line of duty, when a heavy timber frame fell on his head at a crime scene. Now, after three years of hospital beds, chronic pain and humiliating daily mishaps, Lincoln Rhyme is only interested in how to get a doctor to assist him in ending his life. Then his former colleagues on the force come to him with the case Amelia Sachs investigated, and Rhyme discovers that he may have lost everything, but he still has his passion for solving puzzles. The unknown perpetrator of the murder has intentionally left clues at the crime scene that seem to lead to his next victim. It seems he wants to be stopped, if only the cops manage to decrypt his messages in time.

Together, the bedridden forensic expert and the glamorous redhead, are poring over the mysterious artifacts in a race against time to put a stop to this crime spree. What makes Deaver stand out from a crowded field of would-be bestsellers is his rigorous approach to the scientific angle of a crime scene investigation (I actually believe the TV series CSI was inspired by the Lincoln Rhyme series) , the richness of detail regarding the city and the real clever developments in the plot, put there not only for their shocking value, but as an illustration of the salient points in the police procedures described. Oh, and did I mention this is a true-blood page-turner, the kind that keeps you awake until morning in order to finally find out whodunit?

A criminalist is a renaissance man.
He’s got to know botany, geology, ballistics, medicine, chemistry, literature, engineering. If he knows facts – that ash with a high strontium content probably came from a highway flare, that ‘facta’ is Portuguese for knife, that Ethiopian diners use no utensils and eat with their right hands exclusively, that a slug with five land-and-groove rifling marks, right twist, could not have been fired from a Colt pistol – if he knows these things he may just make the connection that places an unsub* at the crime scene.

* unsub = unknown subject

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Revising my notes a couple of weeks after finishing the novel, I felt the need to curb my enthusiasm a little, down to 4 stars. I still believe this is one of the best modern thrillers I’ve read, but I wonder how truly memorable the plot is? Yes, it makes for a gripping, edge of your seat experience, but it is also limited by the conventions of the genre: the timeline is just too tightly compressed, with too many murders taking place over just a couple of days, too many Hollywood-style narrow escapes, while the ending is just a tad too smart for its own good, with one too many reversals to make it credible.
But I will say this: I want to read more from Deaver, and that’s high praise considering how fast my TBR pile is growing.

I was ecstatic when I found out I won from Goodreads this special copy of The Bone Collector by Jeffrey Deaver. I get, not only the first story of the Lincoln Rhyme series, but the short story, Captivated, where we meet Jeffrey Deaver’s new character Colter Shaw and an excerpt from his new Colter Shaw series, Book I, The Never Game.

I loved going back to the beginning with Lincoln Rhyme and how it all began. Even though I knew that outcome of his struggle to accept his life after becoming a quadriplegic, I felt his all the suspense and despair.

He finds a kindred spirit in Emilia Sachs. She has her own baggage she carries around, refusing to let anyone get close to her, searching for her place in life.

The serial killer, though I had a hunch he was ‘right there’, was a surprise to me. I love delving into the twisted minds of those who can do such wretched things to another person. At least he has some feelings, those it doesn’t stop him.

The Bone Collector by Jeffrey Deaver is everything I want in a novel. I love the deep dark world he takes me into and his ability to leave me feeling good about everything when it is all said and done….until the next time.

CAPTIVATED: I love an author bonus and I got a good one with this short story. Colter Shaw is a bounty hunter and he always gets his ‘man’, picking and choosing the jobs he will take on. Colter and Jeffrey were ahead of me every step of the way, keeping me in suspense, never giving away the bad guy until they step forward and expose themselves. I quickly fell for the character and eagerly flipped the pages…

…then moving on to the excerpt for the first book in the series, The Never Game.

He’s in the water, struggling to enter the capsized boat and save the pregnant woman inside. Will he succeed? And why is she in there…alone…

See more at fundinmental

Richtig guter Thriller und sehr gelungener Start der Serie

Deaver hat mit Rhyme einen super interessante Figur gezeichnet. Er ist querschnittsgelähmt und mürrisch aber auch ein brillanter Kriminalist und Meister der Analyse.
Dazu ist die Polizistin Amelia Sachs auch speziell. Beide als Team sind beeindruckend und ihre besondere Art zu ermitteln zieht einen total in Geschichte hinein.
Dazu die Blickwinkel, die immer wieder wechseln und die bildliche Darstellung machen das Ganze zu einem Spektakel. Die vielen kriminaltechnischen Details und Darstellungen sind zwar etwas trocken aber auch interessant und die Spannung bleibt konstant.
Obwohl ich einige Aspekte fraglich fand, macht es am Ende dann doch Sinn und wo man oft denkt, 'das war es jetzt' kommt es dann doch ganz anders.
4,5 Sterne

Really detailed investigative techniques and lots of gore. I'll read more of this series and see how I feel!

n  n    THERE WILL BE SPOILERS THROUGHOUT THIS REVIEWn  n

18/8 - I have seen the movie a number times so I know who the killer is, but I can't remember his exact motive, so at least there'll be one surprise for me at the end. I really enjoyed the movie and was always disappointed that there weren't further instalments in the series. For me, Angelina Jolie is Amelia and Denzel Washington is Lincoln Rhyme (funny that they've both got American president's names), they are now inextricably linked. I will never be able to think about Rhyme or Sachs without seeing them as the actor's portrayals of them.

I'm loving the extra details I'm getting from the book that weren't included in the movie due to time constraints. More details about the first two victims (who are completely different people in the movie), more background on both Sachs and Rhyme, including Rhyme's connections in the police force. It's funny what details get left by the wayside on the journey between a book and the movie/tv show. In the movie Amelia's last name is changed from Sachs to Donaghy (I never get the reasons behind name changes, they seem so arbitrary and pointless) and her arthritis is no longer a contributing factor in her desire to leave Patrol. In fact if I remember rightly there's no mention of her wanting to leave Patrol, she just does spontaneously in order to help Rhyme and solve the case. To be continued...

21/8 - Bloody review-eating website! I can't remember all of what I wrote before it got eaten, but it went something like this. Now that I've finished the book it turns out that the movie is quite different from the book - everyone except Lincoln has had their name changed (or their race, or gender), the killer and his motives are different, the victims are all different as are whether or not they survive, what he does to the victims and the clues he leaves are different. Only Lincoln and the general idea of the story are carried over from the book to the movie.

I really enjoyed the frantic pace injected into the 'evidence examining' scenes by the constant pressure of getting to the victims before they die. In my head I could see the camera flicking from one character to another as Rhyme fires off questions or instructions regarding some bit of evidence or other. I think I might enjoy the next book even more than this one, not having any preconceived notions of the plot, except for what Rhyme and Amelia look like.

PopSugar 2015 Reading Challenge: A Mystery of Thriller