Customer Reviews

Crime School

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

 

 

This 6th in the series (following Mallory's Oracle, The Man Who Cast Two Shadows, Killing Critics, Stone Angel, and (for me)the disappointing Shell Game)expands the character and pysche of the troubled Sgt. Kathleen Mallory. This borderline pysocopath/sociopath cop battles her own personal demons of murder, betrayal, and revenge as she sets out to stop a serial killer. The similarities between the killer and the cop are both subtle and striking. We learn more about her twisted childhood and her relationship with Riker and Charles Butler. I thought this book was a fascinating portrayal of a very disturbing woman. The story was fast-paced and very suspenseful. I suggest that readers finish the earlier volumes in the series to better understand Mallory's background.

What is it about Carol O'Connell's Kathy Mallory series? Kathy Mallory is about the least sympathetic heroine of any genre...a genuine anti-anti-anti heroine. And O'Connell's writing is moody and rough - kind of like its places-you've-never-been-in-New York setting. These are never easy reads and yet I can't put them down, especially Crime School. I think it may be because I like Charles Butler and Detective Riker so very much. And because they love Mallory despite everything. And because I want her to finally pay attention to Charles (which she never will). As usual, O'Connell's plots fly all around the past and present and you have to hang on for dear life. And, as usual, you end up wanting to know more. But isn't that the hallmark of a good book? I still think that O'Connell's best book was the standalone (not of the Mallory series) "Judas Child", wherein again she specializes in wounded characters. Who knows where these twisted humans come from in Carol O'Connell's brain, but she certainly does give them convincing life.

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Mallory (don't call her "Kathy" if you want to live), is a unique detective hero. She's an NYPD "Special Crimes" Detective, who makes her own rules, takes no hostages, and can make you believe she'd kill for her own sense of justice.

~ * ~ Mallory was taken in at age 10 ?? by an NYPD cop, who found her as a tough street kid, apparently a "throwaway". In earlier novels she is eerily without the type of "consicence" we recognize though we can sympathize with her ruthless pursuit of justice, especially in avenging her foster father's death.

In the novel, "Stone Angel", we learned a little about how she came to live on the New York streets.

In this story we learn more about her life on the streets, when a prostitute is found hanged at an arson scene. Riker, Mallory
s partner, a friend of Mallory's father, recognizes the victim as a woman who once gave sporadic shelter and comfort to Mallory as a child.

Mallory has a score to settle with the victim, but she is no less driven to find the killer, terrorizing firefighters and rookie detectives,and walking right over supervising officers's command.

This entry was wonderful for the haunting, yet strangely compelling back story of that illuminates the child Kathy's quest for a sense "home" and "comfort" with the prostitutes, drug dealers, and theives on the streets.

Supporting cast Detective Riker, and genius consultant Charles Butler are written very well, and their dedication to a strange blend of love, healthy fear, and protectiveness of Mallory is just wonderful.

I recommend "Stone Angel" as a companion to the story, together, they offer a wonderful portrait of our herione.

She was a wild child living on the New York streets with only a few uncaring prostitutes to watch over her at times. She was saved from that sordid existence when a kindly police officer and his sweet wife brought her into their home. Their love ultimately saved Kathy Mallory, turning her into one of the finest detectives in the special crimes unit of the Big Apple.

Twenty years ago, a woman was killed in her apartment but thanks to sloppy police work the killer was never found. Two decades later, a prostitute is killed in a similar manner. The police theorize that it's a copycat killing even if they don't understand how the perpetrator has the details that were kept from the public. Mallory is one of the investigators on the case as a series of murders connect Kathy the child to Mallory the policewoman.

It has been four long years since a Kathy Mallory novel was published but the long wait was worth it. Fans of Mallory actually get to see her as a child surviving by her wits on the street. Carol O'Connell still has the magic touch when it comes to creating fascinating police procedurals that enthrall the audience. Let's hope we won't have to wait another four years for a novel starring this complex yet likable heroine.

Harriet Klausner

I really enjoyed reading Crime School, but this is the last Mallory novel I think I'm going to be able to read without her showing some signs of personal growth. I understand O'Connell's desire not to compromise this winning character. However, there is only so far you can go with the sociopath riff without showing movement or changing the focus character.

The last few books have displayed more and more of Mallory, exploring her limited nature in various ways. At best, the character is by turns magical and frightening. The things that made her that way are gradually being exposed. I don't want her to turn into a character from a cozy, but some change would be good. I either want her to go darker or I want her to start to come to terms with herself.

O'Connell has a significant challenge now. Until this point, it has been enough for the reader to be the real detectives, exploring the story of Mallory. We have seen enough of that. Where to go now?

I love O'Connell's ability to characterize! Some of the other reviewers seem a bit frustrated with this book. I too, wait for Mallory to 'let someone in', which she seems so unable to do. Of course, given her childhood background...I'd probably react to human kindness the way she does. Mallory's been an enigma from the first book. She's solving crimes, but sometimes it's a debate whether the crime is more interesting, or Mallory is?
A child forced to become an adult before she was ready, and who grows up in a precinct station in New York is hardly likely to be normal...

A serial murderer is loose on the blonde wanta-be-actresses of New York. This case is tied to a cold case from 20 years ago...and the serial murderer is doing a lot to try to get the attention of the cops. Mallory's friends and her coworker, Riker, are concerned, because as more information comes out concerning the 20-year old case...the suspect seems to have a haunted background and childhood suspiciously like Mallory's and they can't quit drawing parallels to her life. Why did her mind bend towards dealing with a her hard life in a certain way that put her within accepted societal mores, while this serial murderer is definitely asocial?

I really appreciate getting some new information concerning Mallory. She can keep being mysterious and aloof, but we, the readers, want to know more about what makes Mallory tick.

Only big problem I had with the book, is tying in the actress angle with the first murder...maybe I missed something.

Oh...and O'Connell introduces a new younger cop for Mallory to torture! Mallory's biggest parallel with the serial murderer is her inability to connect with those who care about her, including Charles, her very nonjudgemental friend who thinks he is too ugly for her...yet she doesn't even 'see' herself as beautiful. Wonder if this little dilemma will ever be resolved.
This reader hopes so...yet worries that it will be unsatisfying if Mallory ever normalizes her relationships...

Karen Sadler

It's engaging because "Crime School" has a mystery that kept me guessing right up until the end of the book. I didn't know the red herring wasn't the killer until almost the final page. It's frustrating because I keep waiting for Mallory to display some real growth or affection for the worshipful Charles or her partner Ryker and, even after her experiences in past books, she seems unable to. Carol O'Connell mentions in passing here, as I think in other books, that the forty-something, unmarried and childless Charles will live a long life and will keep a journal to pass on to his children and grandchildren. I can only hope that in some future book he will get his heart's desire: Mallory. In this book, there are no real developments. I'll add another brief caution. Readers who haven't read the previous Mallory books may find themselves bewildered. There's a lot of discussion about her childhood, but nothing about why she's in New York City alone at age 10. If you want to know the back story, go back and read "Stone Angel."

This, the latest entry in the Mallory series, is also the weakest. Not that first time readers would notice -- O'Connell is so darn good at her craft that even less-than-her-best beats most of the competition. Problem is, she was written a novel that "fills in the gaps" for her Mallory character while FORGETTING what made the character great in the first place. The ultimate peccadillo, even for one of O'Connell's rank, is to write a book that resonates only with those who have already fallen in love with the character because of earlier books. And that's what this is. Mallory is, as always, arrogant, dry and aloof. In this book, however, no one really cares...

...and bring my own cold drink and popcorn to see a catfight between Mallory and Eve Dallas.

There is a fascinating synchronicity between Carol O'Connell's Kathleen Mallory and "J.D.Robb"'s Eve Dallas.

Both are tough cops. Both are beautiful women. And both are the toughest so-and-so in their respective New York police forces. Both have close, personal relationships with computers. ;-)

And both were feral children, their lives, psyches and emotions twisted and knotted by horrific acts of violence.

Mallory and her partner, Riker, respond to a call in another area, helping out a squad that's short on manpower due to a recent mini-epidemic of a nasty flu. Arriving, they find a horribly-bungled crime scene, and a hanged woman, her hair cut off and used to gag her.

And they know her.

To Riker, she had been one of his best informants when she was a junkie prostitute. To Mallory, she was something else -- something more personal and, like so much of Mallory's past, something twisted up with pain, love, hate and emotion.

Both Riker and Mallory want to take this case, for their own reasons -- but their lieutenant is going to buck it back to the precinct that originally caught it... until Mallory links it to another killing, done in the same manner, twenty years before, and still unsolved.

Before the case is closed, more people will die, Mallory's friends (and the reader) will learn more of her past, how she survived on the streets of New York, on her own at age eight... how Detective Lou Markowitz and his wife Helen took in the feral child and, if not civilised her, at least tamed her somewhat.

If you've never read any of Mallory's earlier adventures, be warned -- parts of this book are going to take you where the nasty things wriggle, just outside of the light. There are a lot of unpleasant people in this world, and cops meet most of them sooner or later.

But Mallory is such a fascinating character -- and her relationships with the cops she works with and the people around her are so interesting -- that the pages seem to turn themselves, and, by the time you reach the end, emotionally, the feeling is as if you'd ridden a particularly good roller coaster.

If you haven't met Mallory before this, do yourself a favour -- pick up her adventures, get to know her, enter her world, see it through her eyes. It may not be pretty, but it's absolutely enthralling.

I have heard that all children are sociopaths, with the worrisome question being why do some stay sociopaths into adulthood? O'Connell's series featuring Sgt. Kathleen Mallory combines excellent mystery writing with fascinating portrayals of Mallory, who believes herself to be a sociopath, and the few people she has allowed close to her.

In Crime School we discover even more of Mallory's childhood, including life-threatening episodes and betrayal by someone dear to her. It's no wonder that she has cut herself off from the rest of humanity and attempted to eliminate all softness in herself.

For those who are looking for some hope... all is not lost. Pay attention to which characters she allows to touch her.