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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
"Was an innocent man executed?",
By
This review is from: Eye of the Beholder (Hardcover)
In "Eye of the Beholder," by David Ellis, a sadistic assailant murders and mutilates six young women (two students along with four runaways and prostitutes), each in a different manner. One of the victims is heiress Cassie Bentley, the spoiled daughter of influential and wealthy parents. Detective Joel Lighter is the investigator and the prosecutor is First Assistant County Attorney Paul Riley, who quickly realizes that this investigation could launch his career. Much to Riley's relief, the matter is quickly resolved when a part-time handyman, Terry Burgos, who had been stalking one of the victims, is arrested and confesses to the crime. Riley successfully argues for the death penalty and Burgos is executed eight years later.Another eight years pass, and the Burgos trial is a distant memory. A reporter named Carolyn Pendry airs a documentary in which she argues that Burgos did not belong on Death Row in the first place; he was clearly psychotic and should have been treated in a facility for the criminally insane. A mysterious man watches Pendry's program, someone with a secret agenda and murderous impulses of his own. This individual embarks on a new killing spree that raises a disturbing question: Was the right person put to death? Fifty-one year old Paul Riley has changed over the years. He now belongs to a large law firm and commands impressive fees for defending white collar criminals. His chief client is Harland Bentley, father of Cassie, one of the six women that Burgos allegedly killed. Riley is in love with the governor's daughter, Shelly Trotter, but she is reluctant to commit to a long-term relationship. Soon Paul starts receiving a series of cryptic notes that appear to have a connection to the Burgos murders. Even more horrifying, additional killings convince both the police and Riley that someone else may have had a hand in the crimes for which Terry took sole responsibility. Detectives Michael McDermott and Ricki Stoletti look into the latest crimes, and they reluctantly work with Riley (whom they don't trust), trying to locate a shadowy figure who kills silently and disappears without a trace. David Ellis goes back and forth in time between 1989 and 2005. In addition, he frequently changes point of view between the first and third person. As the story drags on for almost four hundred pages, the plot becomes increasingly turgid and confusing. The resolution is so convoluted that it takes many pages of exposition to explain who did what to whom and why. Although "Eye of the Beholder" has its fair share of thrills and moments of suspense and sheer terror, Ellis tries to do too much. He populates his book with a host of underdeveloped characters, creates at least a half-dozen red herrings that go nowhere, and then scrambles to tie up all of his loose threads. What should have been an electrifying thriller is instead an irritating and jarring tale of a monumentally dysfunctional family, a homicidal maniac, and a lawyer caught up in a gothic drama that he doesn't begin to understand.
18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
excellent police procedural,
This review is from: Eye of the Beholder (Hardcover)
In the summer of 1989, six women were found in the basement near the maintenance lockers of Mansbury College. All the women were tortured and each died in a different manner ranging from strangulation to near decapitation. One of the victims, college student Ellie Danzinger had gotten a restraining order out against Terry Burgos, a part time handyman at the college. Whey they went to his home, they found enough evidence to convict him for five of the killings. The case of the sixth girl he killed Cassie Bentley, daughter to a mega-mogul billionaire was never tried to her father's influence. In 1996, Terry is killed but his last words, cryptic though they might be, were to the prosecutor Paul Riley: "I am not the only one".In the present, a series of murders are linked to the killings in 1989. Paul Riley, now the head of mega powerful law firm, receives strange notes from the killer, has his finger prints on one of the victims and is forced into part of the new case with it evidence similar to the case that solidified his reputation. Looked upon from a fresh perspective with new information, Riley finds that the 1989 case didn't reveal all its secrets and someone wants them to stay buried. This is one of the most energizing and emotionally satisfying police procedurals of the year. David Ellis makes his characters come alive so that readers will either root for or detest them; no one will remain detached. There is plenty of action and the changing from the eighties to the nineties to the present is smooth so that the readers are never jarred out of the storyline. The protagonist as he ages from a man who sees life as black and white to a person who realize there are subtle greys has to make some decisions as he confronts his greatest success with the realization it is also his greatest failure. Harriet Klausner
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
a new author for my must have list,
By
This review is from: Eye of the Beholder (Hardcover)
This was a really good read it sucked you in from the first page.the story was told in such a way you kept thinking you had solved it then there was another twist. have to say housework suffered as I only took 2days to read it. I will now be looking for other books by david ellis
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