I that this book was a major disappointment. Patricia Cornwell has certainly written much better books in the past. Everything felt very unfinished. It felt like this might have been a few chapters of another book and was discarded....and now published later. Don't bother.

Wow, Great detective mystery. A state investigator known as Geronimo to investigate a cold case murder. His boss DA Lamont is running for governor, she is the reason he was called in on the case. He ends up getting threats toward his grandmother.
Expect twist and turns. Very good who done it. Really like this book and the mystery.

Am I the only one that found the plot way too convoluted? Taking an older murder from another state, sending the blood evidence to a lab in California and having this huge conspiracy about insider trading with a rape thrown in for no good reason that I could see. And I'm so jaded I thought the rape was actually a BDSM sexual encounter that was taken the wrong way.

I'm pretty sure this is my first time reading this author and I don't plan on picking up any of her other books anytime soon.

It's not often that a serial author gets to introduce a new character to her fanbase, so I had high hopes when I picked up this book. Unfortunately, much like the Andy Brazil series, Patricia Cornwell fires off a panoply of shallow, one-dimensional characters with seemingly little motivation in the actions they take.

The worst offense of this book, however, isn't the character development - it's the lack of an actual story. We're expected to believe that two detectives in different states with different backgrounds solve three separate crimes without actually doing any investigation. Oh, and one of those crimes actually occurs in a third state that neither has jurisdiction in.

All in all, a very disappointing outing. I might have actually quit reading this book, but it's so short I was done before I had a chance.

Patricia Cornwell normally writes serial killer stories with heavy reliance on forensics. Here she has tried to write something like a political thriller with a murder mystery to go along. Both were weak, to say the least. Nothing great to write about. Just +1 to my have-read list :)

Patricia Cornwell is an excellent writer and once started, couldn't put this book down. It's fairly short and the first in a series where our Massachusetts investigator, Winston Garano (aka "Win" or "Geronimo") is introduced. Win is very good looking and bright, but has a chip on his shoulder because he didn't go to an Ivy League school. He manages to dress very well and Cornwell let's us know how he does it. Win isn't the only interesting character in the book. Enjoy! I did.

1.5 stars.

Take the author's name off the cover and I would have never guessed this was written by the same woman who wrote the Scarpetta series. It has an amateur-ish feel to it - badly written, badly drawn characters and plot holes bigger than last year's worn out underwear. For instance, why would Lamont announce the first case for the "At Risk" (stupid name for a taskforce) when she hasn't even read the case file? She acts like the case has already been solved (DNA evidence isn't a substitute for police work - they still have a case to prove). And why does she think anyone would care about a 30 year old cold case from a different state? Lamont comes off dumber than a bag of hammers. And this is what I was thinking in the first couple of pages. It doesn't really get any better.

I gave it 1 star for actually finishing this novella (stretched out in my copy by large margins to a bloated 300 pages) and a 0.5 star because it makes me want to go back to Cornwell's earliest novels to find out why I thought she was a good writer in the first place.

I LOVED Post Mortem and ended up buying a copy of this book at a garage sale when I recognized the author's name.

Name or not, this book seems like it was written by an entirely different author. I've never liked present tense as it usually comes off as rushed and informal. I wasn't a fan of the third-person omniscient POV, especially in a murder mystery, and this book was even more jerky and annoying by jumping into the heads of random non-characters like the governor and his limo driver. I thought I was stupidly misunderstanding the plot, but when I came to the reviews I realized it definitely wasn't just me. This honestly felt like a Patterson and I am NOT a fan of Patterson.

Also, literally all of the female characters in the book are cougars falling over themselves to chase after stupid sexy Winston Garano. A friend with cripplingly low self-esteem ruins her career and schooling to follow him around like a puppy and take his orders, all while hopelessly in unrequited love with him. Scarpetta was the epitome of lady badass in Post Mortem, so this was hard to read. Bleh.

I'd like to give this a 2 12 star rating. I had a bit of a hard time getting in to it but the last 14 of the book was okay and made up for the slow beginning (and this is a very short book). I got this at the library used book store for 50¢. I am so glad I didn't pay full price for it. I used to love Patricia Cornwall books until she got so strange in her Kay Scarpetta series. I thought having a book with a new character would be good. I found the main characters love for designer clothing and the finer things in life a big distraction from the story especially with the constant commentary on how he was able to afford those items. I felt that the discrepancy between the "haves and have nots" was also constantly thrown in my face. It was necessary I guess to give an insight into the main character's psyche but I like to like the people in the books I read. There is so much anger and jealousy in the story. I will be reading the next in the series because I got it at the same time I got this one.

Shifting gears, Patricia Cornwell pens a novella that introduces readers to a new character with many unique features. Winston Garano works for the Massachusetts State Police, assigned to liaise closely with one of the most power-hungry women who possesses the title of District Attorney. With her eyes on the Governor's Mansion, she will stop at nothing to get a leg up, literally. While Garano is studying at the National Forensics Academy, he is summoned back from Knoxville to attend to some pressing business. The DA has decided she wants to toss her hat into the ring for the upcoming gubernatorial race and needs an edge. She's created a new program she calls At Risk, utilising the up-and-coming technology of DNA analysis and seeks to apply it to an old case that might earn her praise and recognition. Funny enough, this case is a murder down in Tennessee, which will allow Garano to continue his studies while bolstering the DA's image. Dismissing it, Garano mumbles to himself and prepares to head back south when a violent crime hits close to home and he receives a mysterious phone call about this new case, both of which propel him into action. Working alongside a fellow classmate and current Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Special Agent, Garano slowly commences piecing it all together. However, the crime in Massachusetts stinks to high heaven as well, forcing him to spend some time looking into this. What was an attempt to help smaller police forces may be a political battle for Massachusetts Governor and Garano cannot be in the middle of it. Cornwell does well in showing off her new crime minion in this shorter story, pulling readers into the fray with the greatest of ease.

It is said you write what you know, which is how Cornwell created and mastered such a wonderful character in Kay Scarpetta. With Winston Garano, things flow nicely and his backstory is one that is surely intriguing, but even with a hook such as his mixed African America/Italian heritage, he does not hold a candle to the great Scarpetta. I felt as though the story sought to skim the water, a filler, perhaps, between writing assignments, as it does not have the pizzazz for which Cornwell is known. I admit to using this novel to fill a small period of time before I launch myself into a larger project. The development of characters is decent enough and the story flows smoothly, though it seems to drift along in spots, as though there is nothing to hold it together and no impetus to draw the story out into areas not foreseen. I did not feel connected or pulled in to see more about Garano as I might have with other characters. That said, it is not a horrid piece of writing by any stretch of the imagination. I'll finish things off with the follow-up novella and be able to offer something more cogent at that time.

Kudos, Madam Cornwell for attempting to branch out, though perhaps this is more a means of idling as your next Scarpetta masterpiece came to you.

Like/hate the review? An ever-growing collection of others appears at:
http://pecheyponderings.wordpress.com/

PROTAGONIST: Winston Garano, Massachusetts State Police investigator
SERIES: Standalone - originally written as a 15-part series for The New York Times Magazine
RATING: 2.25

Back in 1990, Patricia Cornwell took the mystery reading world by storm with the publication of Postmortem. That book was groundbreaking in that its lead character, Dr. Kay Scarpetta, was a medical examiner and there was a heavy focus on forensics. The detailed forensic analyses obviously appealed to the reading public; Cornwell's subsequent books have all shot to the head of the best seller lists upon release. Along the way, however, many in the mystery reading community found the series to be degrading in quality over time. In each book, the characters became more outrageous and the problems they faced more outlandish. As a result, many gave up on reading Cornwell at all.

At Risk is a departure from the Scarpetta series. It was created as a 15-part serial for The New York Times Magazine. The book introduces Winston Garano, also known as "Win" or "Geronimo", who is an investigator for the Massachusetts State Police. He is directed by the District Attorney, Monique Lamont, who is tough and politically ambitious, to solve a cold case originating in Tennessee. The idea is that if Win solves the case, it will show that the Massachusetts police can beat "any crime any time" and bring national attention to the team (and more specifically, Monique). Frankly, I found that whole premise weak. It didn't seem logical that such an assignment would be made, way outside the normal boundaries of the agency. I'm sure there were at least a few unsolved Massachusetts homicides that might have benefited from an investigation.

I wasn't looking forward to reading At Risk after having given up on the Scarpetta series. Much to my surprise, I found it tolerable (meaning that I could finish it!). The writing in present tense annoyed me, and I also felt irritated by Win's putting the bulk of the investigative work on to a female associate. Although it is not a great work of art, the characters are relatively sane and the plot seemed possible if not plausible.

It will be interesting to see if Cornwell decides to use this as a foundation for another series. As expected, the book hit the best seller list immediately upon publication.

Winston Garano is called back from Knoxville to Boston by the Boston D.A. She's planning to run for governor and has an idea about using DNA to solve closed cases. She's focused on a twenty year old murder in Tennessee. Garano doesn't trust the DA, can't find the file that will help him work on the closed case, wants to go back to Knoxville and his forensic classes. It takes awhile before he can, with all that's happening in Boston