Customer Reviews

The Final Victim

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Once again Wendy Corsi Staub has written a book that left me turning in circles til the end. Just when you think you have figured it out you realize you where only part of the way there and the storie is sooo much more involved. She is great at hiding the story in a story. You are following along and never realizing just how wound into the next story the characters all are until the end when you realize you never saw it coming. Its great!

I have loved other books by Wendy Corsi Staub in the past but this one took me for ever to finish. I hate abandonning a book so I persevered. The book is way too long with too many boring descriptions. The end is strange with almost nothing to do with most of the book. It left me with the impression that Corsi Staub did not know where she was going with that one (just as the reader will feel). However, I am not ready on giving up on this author.(just not recommending this piece of work)

Wendy Corsi Staub outdoes herself again with her newest novel set in South Carolina. I have read all of Ms. Staub's previous novels and enjoyed each one, and this is no exception. This book has even more depth to it, an even more complex novel than her previous works. As we have come to expect, we are kept guessing until the very end, and she throws in an unexpected twist. You won't be disappointed with this novel, its a very entertaining read. As always, I am already looking forward to the next novel from this very talented author.

After losing her son in a drowning accident and her husband soon after in a divorce, Charlotte Remington thinks she will never be happy again. That is until she meets Royce Maitland, who suffered similar losses. They eventually fall in love and marry living in her grandfather's mansion on Achoco Island while their Savannah home is renovated.

When her grandfather dies, Charlotte expects to inherit one third of his estate with the rest going to her cousins Gib and Phyllida. Nobody is more shocked than Charlotte when she learns at the reading of the will that she inherited everything. Her cousins are livid and threaten to sue; shortly after someone shoots Royce. Evidence lead to the arrest of Gib, but he is more concerned over what the police will find in his room than the assault charge that he insists he did not do. While her beloved daughter remains on the island, Charlotte is on the mainland discovering some devastating news that leads her to believe death is on the move with her the people on the island a likely target.

Wendy Corsi Staub writes a psychological suspense tale that pulls the reader deeply into the exhilarating story line. The characters are fully developed whether they are the protagonists or the antagonists although the audience will not be sure who to classify where. THE FINAL VICTIM is fast-paced and action-packed while focusing on a heroine who though she has suffered traumatically has courageously rebuilt her life and refuses to allow anyone to destroy it or those she cherishes.

Harriet Klausner

I couldn't finish this book...Not because it was bad really, but because it did nothing to pull me in. I tried twice to pick it back up,then flipped to middle and the end. The ending left alot to be desired also...It partially may have been the characters,who felt empty and shallow. The "heroine" was really good at looking the other way, and was too hung up on her bad luck in the past to seem to really enjoy anything, and at the same time took everything for granted. Despite being stuck with a bad ex-husband and a bratty teenager,she was from old money and lived on their own island almost. It was hard to be sympathetic...
I wouldn't recommend this...

After the death of her patriarchal grandfather, Charlotte Remington Maitland has come home to her family's estate in Savannah after her own devastating loss. With a new husband and her teenaged daughter in tow, Charlotte hopes to find a second chance at a happy life. Things seem to be going well, until the terms of her grandfather's will are revealed and she learns that everything has been left to her, and her cousins and other family members are puzzled and infuriated. There was plenty to go around, yet Charlotte is the sole beneficiary and has no idea what to do with it all or how to appease her cousins. She wants to offer them each a settlement, but even that doesn't seem to be good enough, because there's someone out there who doesn't just want Charlotte's inheritance...they want her dead.

Staub is very much a student of the Mary Higgins Clark school of suspense fiction, and I think she's really improving. This book is much better than the last one of hers I read, which I can't recall the name of at the moment but was her debut novel. I enjoyed that one too, but the polishing of skill is more evident here. I don't care for the title and think it sounds a little silly, but that's minor. The villain in the story is not exactly shocking, but compelling all the same and it did take a little while for me to be able to make a truly educated guess. I enjoyed it all around and for any fans of the female-protagonist suspense genre along the lines of MHC will be pleased.

I am a huge fan of Mary Higgins Clark and the blurb of this book's cover ready: "If you like Mary Higgins Clark, you'll love Wendy Corsi Staub". Well, it's almost completely true. Mary Higgins Clark is the true suspense queen and I've been reading her books since her first in 1978. But Wendy Corsi Staub is a gifted writer. She manages to keep the culprit hidden from her readers until the absolute last minute. You think you know who it is, then you don't, then you do, etc. And you're always wrong! My daughter lent me one of these books and since then, I've read several and intend to read all of her books. They are very interesting.

"The Final Victim" is the first book I have read by Wendy Corsi Staub. I have been reading Donna Anders' thrillers, and was looking for more reading along the same lines: an exciting thriller written from a female point of view, but not a crossover romance, as I have found many books in this genre to be. "The Final Victim" is a satisfyingly thick, exciting, and suspenseful gothic tale, set in an old family mansion on an island near Savannah. The point of view shifted from character to character a lot, which sometimes detracted from the reading experience. There was some painful detail used in itemizing the exact articles of clothing the heroine's husband is wearing when he first appears, as one often sees in a romance novel, but there was also some really nice characterization: the physical description of the family housekeeper was excellent and gave a lot of insight into her personality, and the old family chauffeur was also portrayed with a light and skillful hand. The personality and physical characteristics of a family cousin who has had cosmetic surgery and has been trying to fake it in Hollywood is also summed up in a really witty, restrained way. The story is quite exciting and atmospheric, kept me at the edge of my seat. I really enjoyed "The Final Victim" and will be ordering more books by the same author.

I love Wendy Corsi Staub and anxiously await for her next novel to be published. The Final Victim did not disappoint. Just as I thought I had figure out whodunit, a new clue was thrown in. Once I started reading, I could not put it down. Highly recommend.

The thing is, it's not a bad read. However, I had the bad guy figured out by chapter three. And we are given such rambling nonsense to slug through - it feels like the editors told her she had to write so many words before she could be finished. WAAAYYY too long.