Customer Reviews

Blind Alley (Eve Duncan Forensics Thriller, Book 5)

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(14)
1 star:		(32)

 

 

"Blind Alley" is the fifth novel in the continuing story of Eve Duncan, forensic sculptor, Joe Quinn, Atlanta police detective and Jane MacGuire, their precocious seventeen year old adopted daughter rescued from the streets. Be warned that much of this review might be construed as spoilers but I'm betting that it's not going to matter much since you'll likely be giving the book a pass anyway!

I used to treat Iris Johansen as a sure thing! You know what I mean - the kind of author whose new title you'd add to your reading list without even caring what the plot line was or you'd pick up a copy at the store without even bothering to flip open the dust jacket for a peek! "Blind Alley" buried that thought - cold, deep and fast! It was a great deal more than just bad - it was truly painful!

A shadowy serial killer named Aldo is on the loose slaughtering women in a most unseemly, gruesome fashion. Carving their living faces right off their skulls, Aldo imagines himself responsible for the systematic elimination of all women who resemble Cira, a courtesan/actress/prostitute killed two thousand years ago in the town of Herculaneum when Vesuvius erupted. It would seem that Aldo is a little upset at having lost the love and attention of his father, an archeologist who became obsessed with Cira when he discovered her statue and some details of her life.

As if that isn't deep enough in left field as the premise for a thriller, imagine the eyebrows you'll raise when you read that Jane MacGuire, Eve Duncan and Joe Quinn's adopted 17 year old daughter is a ringer for Cira. Not only does she find herself stalked by Aldo but some inexplicable psychological attachment to Cira plagues Jane with regular nightmares in which she is trapped in caves or tunnels fleeing for her life from the eruption of Vesuvius.

It doesn't end there - Johansen tosses Mark Trevor into the mix. He's a con and an antiquities smuggler (picture Lovejoy with a nasty streak!) who had a run-in with Aldo and is intent on killing him. To that end he intrudes himself into Eve Duncan's and Joe Quinn's life and sets himself up as Jane's protector. Now, I'm no prude but the scene in which Trevor, a grown man at least as old as Joe, has a near sexual encounter with Jane, a typical seventeen year old teenager with respect to her hormones and sexuality, is just plain distasteful and, frankly, scored well into the red zone on the "yuk" meter!

There is just so much wrong with this novel, it's difficult to know where to begin and where to stop - nightmares that start, happen and end with no explanation or psychological development at all; unlike any previous Johansen novel I've read, the characters and dialogue seem trite, wooden and completely contrived; the outcome of Mark Trevor as a character is left spectacularly un-resolved; Eve Duncan's obsession with her murdered daughter, Bonnie, continues unabated and is definitely becoming downright irritating; a wonderful sub-plot concerning Eve's forensic reconstruction of a real skull from the Vesuvius eruption was simply deep-sixed!

I still own a few Johansen titles that I haven't read so there is perhaps hope. But she'll have to prove to me that she hasn't jumped the shark before I'll spend another cent on a new title!

Paul Weiss

This is going to be the last Iris Johansen book I'll buy in hardcover, and there's no certainty I'll be buying any in paperback either.

Although this book is promoted as being about Eve Duncan, don't be fooled. She, and her partner Joe Quinn, are very peripheral characters here. Instead, its their 17 year old, foster daughter Jane that takes center stage. And she has none of the character or personality of her fictional parents. In fact, Jane is just flat out boring.

Seems there's a killer going around and cutting the faces off women that look like Jane. His motives are confusing, and pretty nonsensical, but no matter. For a villian, he's dull and 2-dimensional, and completely without personality. He exists purely to be thwarted. At no time does he comes across as menacing, there are no suprises.

The male romantic lead here is Trevor, and like Jane and the villian, he too comes across as dull and uninspiring. Perhaps its just me, but the attraction that develops between 17 year old Jane, and 30+ Trevor was just uncomfortable. I don't understand how an author thats created such interesting, inspiring characters like Eve Duncan, Joe Quinn, Sarah, Logan, Elena, Galen, Judd Morgan can fail so utterly in infusing life and energy into her newest creations.

My advice, save your money on this one, at least in hardcover. This book might be a tolerable paperback read if you are in a bind, and want something that won't tax your brain or require any emotional investment.

I am getting ready to move to our new house and needed a new book to read. Well for some reason this one did not get packed so I grabbed it. What a waste of time. First of all Jane has to be one of the most annoying characters I have come across in a long time. I was actually cheering for Aldo to kill her just so she would shut up. Then Trevor (an adult male) having a crush on Jane (a 17 year old girl) was just creepy. I do not care if he was there to try and help no preverted man who is lusting after my high school daughter is coming into our lives.
The plot was pathetic and after all the building up to catch Aldo the writer ends the climax in like two paragraphs.
DO NOT WASTE YOU TIME !!!

Where did Iris Johansen put Eve Duncan after so many successful years?
I have read all but two of Johansen's books. I am an admirer of her character Eve Duncan. She developed Eve over the years to be a very strong character.
Blind Alley is a very disappointing piece of work. It's almost as if Johansen decided to make Eve weak in order to make Jane strong. And who is Mark Trevor and why do we need yet another 'rascal' male lead to make the female lead more 'credible'? Poor dialogue. Hardly credible plot line. Strange supporting cast. Bad choice.
Whoever advised Johansen to proceed with this work is looking for new money, not old fans.
Too bad.
Not a good read.

I just finished this book today, and I wish I had read some of the reviews before I ever picked it up. The characters are boring, shallow, and non-descript, and the plot is perfectly linear and predictable. I finished it, which is more than I can say for a few books, but I wouldn't recommend it.

The Eve Duncan scenerio is getting really old. Not only was this book boring, but it failed to even keep a solid story line. I rarely sell or give away books, but this is one that will go.

I told my husband I wanted to finish this book so I could throw it across the room. Every thing is repetitive in it. I did not like one single character. When the author tries to make these characters strong she just made them annoying. I WISH I would have read the other reviews before I wasted money on this trash. Like another reviewer said -Aldo should have killed them all after the first couple of chapters and put us all out of our misery. As for the child molester Trevor ----that was just sick. A grown man lusting after a 17 year old. What was this author thinking???????

Where to begin? The plot is preposterous. But other reviewers have covered the storyline vagaries, and repeating them is distasteful. The characters are phony. The dialogue is wooden. There is no atmosphere, no distinct sense of place. Cliches abound, and when you think the writer couldn't top the last one--she does. In short, this book is not even worth discussion. It should simply be dismissed. Why didn't the editors and publishers do exactly that?

This was my first book by Ms. Johansen. It will also be my last.

I was able to get through this book primarily because of two reasons: 1. I had never read anything by Iris Johansen before, so I was loathe to give up quickly 2. I was suffering from a temporary lack of other available reading material.

My friend John likes to say that nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the average person. I think this book is a good example of that.

The book wasn't totally without merit, or completely unentertaining. It was however full of cliches', which I won't mention specifically as they would be considered 'spoilers', but like a fruit cart getting toppled chase scene in an action film, or a 'bullet from nowhere' that takes out the villain (right between the eyes, of course) at the last possible moment before the innocent victim meets his or her demise, this book is full of overdone, outworn situations, constructs and outcomes.

I was so bored with this book. It just went on and on and on...
I love Iris Johansen and have read all of her other books. They were all great. I dont know what happened here. Just trying to get a book out???? I hope she does better next time.