Customer Reviews

Blindsight (G K Hall Large Print Book Series)

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I've been recommended Robin Cook before but this is the first time I've ever read one of his novels. I was pleasantly surprised. The book sucks you in from beginning to end. The foreshadowing's all there, but it really doesn't become apparent just what's going on until near the end of the book, so it always keeps you interested and guessing. The pages fly by with great action and character moments, and the characters themselves are fun to get involved with. Also, the book never gets bogged down in too much medical explanation. There's just enough to let the reader know what's going on, but you don't need a degree to understand what's being explained.

This is an entertaining book, although perhaps not the best of the author's many books. Sill, fans of the author will enjoy reading and solving this mystery, as Dr. Laurie Montgomery, a young forensic pathologist who works in the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner for the City of New York, begins to take notice that an unusual number of young professionals seem to be succumbing to an overdose of cocaine. She begins to suspect that something is seriously amiss, but what is it?

She strikes up a friendship with Columbo-like Detective Lieutenant Lou Saldano with the Homicide Bureau of NYPD. He does not initially share her concerns over these drug induced deaths, as he is more focused on a number of mob related killings, which may signify that an all out mob war may loom in the not too distant future. Despite their divergent opinions on the deaths of these young professionals, Lou has the hots for Laurie, but timing is everything. Despite the mutual attraction, Laurie has just been swept off her feet by a wealthy ophthalmologist to whom her parents have introduced her. As it turns out, this ophthalmologist has a mob boss as a patient, the very same mob boss that Lou is investigating. Laurie's infatuation with this eye doctor causes a little friction between Laurie and Lou. Still, the nature of their work thrusts them together, and they will discover that their concerns are not mutually exclusive.

The author weaves a fine plot, even though the author's cookie-cutter characters leave something to be desired. Still, the clever plot will keep the reader eagerly turning the pages of this book, even though the discerning reader will probably solve the mystery before the Laurie and Lou do so. This book makes for a quick, enjoyable read.

I love these medical mystery novels of Robin Cook and Michael Crichton, something akin to John Christopher's natural-earthwide-disaster books in the 1950's. Yes, something starts out slow and small and spreads out viciously, yet one smart scientist, doctor, cop or forensic pathologist will catch on, alert the right people, barely escape his/her own death by the evil villians who've found out that he knows, and yeah! In the end, the bad guys will die, disappear, be arrested, or at least, get some nasty injuries. Yahoo! That's the way life should be.

Robin Cook obviously writes quickly, easily, and throws in lots of clues for a person to grab at. One that was transparent: in the life of the pathologist, as she comes and goes to work, we hear about her nasty "old lady" (role out the stock characters barrel!) neighbor who's always spying on her, even telling her to go back and get her umbrella. I thought immediately, "Okay, here we go, Robin! This nosy snoop (never a young handsome man at home writing his novel, or a beautiful woman kept by her husband, or some such thing), yes, this old mean thing is going to be important in the plot somewhere...and probably to intervene when it gets violent/dangerous/hoodlum-ridden.

Sure enough, I got that clue right!

Also, a strange quirk of Cook's is lacing into the story all kinds of details on how our hero gets her breakfast, changes her clothes, combs her hair and other very indifferent details. In the lives of other characters, we assume that they did eat something, change their clothes sometimes and wash now and again, but we're not put through the paces with them. It's odd. I cannot see, as a writer, why Robin Cook is doing it.

This plot about opthalmologists and organ donor victims is semi-predictable, just by reading the back of the paperback version. But a good read anyway!

I like to nitpick for the heck of it. Certainly I should get on this or some other bandwagon and churn out a few predictable but good stories myself. Let's see, how about some archeologists in the San Francisco Bay Area who keep getting called to examine skulls and bones, found underground on sites for new housing projects? WHy are these projects then delayed for six months or more while the neighbors manage to veto the halfway house or ghetto slum/Section 8 planned housing out of their neighborhood? Why does one evil archeologist have at his home a whole basement full of assorted bones and skulls?

Ah ha. Oops, I've given away most of the plot. But a good read it would be, eh?

No, I'll stick to medical mysteries, not archeological mysteries.

One of the reasons I enjoy mysteries so much is that I absolutely suck at figuring them out. I am always surprised at the end. Not here; I knew what was going on and figured out the ending in every detail by page 60. I might retitle this book, "Robin Cook Has a Mortgage Payment to Make." I can't think of any other reason why he would besmirch his reputation by publishing this piece of trash. I'll admit it kept me entertained, but I kept feeling ripped off because I knew what was going to happen. If you are looking for a beach book it's fine, but don't expect literary genius here. In fact, don't expect much and you'll get it.

I found Blindsight to be a little different than, the typical Robin Cook book, if you know what i mean. THis was interesting enough to make me want to ready what other pathological mysteries would Laurie Montgomery have to solve. I could follow her forever. Great read, keep one is suspence, and i couldnt put it down.

This story is not like others RC's medical thrillers in which some doctors are involved with something wrong about the practice of medicine, here is the mob who is using a doctor whom doesn't know what was happening. The story will keep you reading but many times you will know what will be written in the next page, many things of the plot can't be true as for example that anybody can go inside the back door of the morgue just like that, or in NY anybody could say to you that has to go to your home and you'll take him with you in your car and let him in, nevertheless is a good story to read.

I enjoyed reading the story. The story or mystery, itself, was very interesting, but some of the characters could have been better developed. Laurie Montgomery is a forensic pathologist who has noticed that several people have come to the morgue who have O.D. but are not known drug users. Because of the similarities in their deaths, she thinks that there is some bad drugs on the streets that are lethal. She wants to warn the public but doesn't get any help from her boss and the police so she does some investigating on her own. Meanwhile, bodies are piling up in the morgue that look like mafia hits, but the police can't find any connection. I found the story interesting and if you want a good quick read this book should do very well. Enjoy!

The book's plot was extreme (but in this day and age, it didn't seem all THAT implausable.)

The biggest fault I found was at the very end. I thought that the final pages of the book would have been better handled as some sort of "author's epilogue." To have the main characters sitting down and discussing the events in the manner that they did seemed completely strained and unnatural. They were having a conversation, but it seemed that they were reading from a transcript.

It was a disappointing end to an otherwise good read.

I am in the middle of this book right now and it is very good! It has lots of suspense, although hit can be a little bit gory. Not a lot, but it can be. I advise you to read it.

I think of Robin Cook novels as being "paperback novels" in that they are one-time reads (i.e., it's foolish to buy a hardback), because although great page turners, there is little depth once you're in on the "horrible secret conspiracy" (whatever it is). Also, like most "who dunits", in retrospect, the plots are usually unsatisfying because an inadequate foundation for them is lain early in the novel. (Caveat, the lack of foundation is almost essential to creating the suspense of such novels). Given these generalizations, Robin Cook is a master of the genre, and nearly all of his books can't be put down once you've got a good start. BLINDSIGHT is a departure from this structure, in that any intelligent reader is essentially in on the "horrible secret conspiracy" from the start. So, BLINDSIGHT isn't as suspenseful as most other Robin Cook novels. I found the plot complication of a competing crime family to only be confusing. Similarly, the "bad doctor" who apparently knows about the "horrible secret conspiracy" but simply keeps silent is very unconvincing. I'm still unclear on who the "really bad doctor" who gave the hoodlums the necessary medical traing was. And it is unsatisfying that neither "bad doctor" was punished.