First the good... It was a great fast paced little book. The writing was tight, the dialog fast paced, and the characters really jumped off the pages. Very visual. Reading this, was like watching a great movie in my head. There are a ton of characters, and somehow none of them get lost in the shuffle. The writer really did a good job of keeping everything moving along.
Now the bad... As soon as I heard that ABC was bringing out the Nikki Heat books that Richard Castle was writing, I thought it was Brilliant to piggy back the books on top of the show's success. I read the first 3 chapters on line, and I was out of my skin excited. I was picturing a novel about the size of the other Richard Castle books Detective Beckett handed out to her fellow detectives in the pilot episode, to help them track down the murderer who'd been copy-catting murders from the books. I really expected it to be the type of book worthy of Richard Castle's name, a celebrated author who'd had 26 best sellers. Instead, it ended up being almost a book form of an episode.
If you really stop and think about what this book is supposed to represent, the beginning of a new character and series for Richard Castle based on a dynamic New York City Detective, you'll see what I'm trying to say. This book would have a hard time standing on it's own without the show, and that's where I think ABC dropped the ball. I think ABC could have given us a lot more credit for being able to read a full sized novel with strong characters based on Beckett and Castle and not confuse them with the characters on screen. They could have made the characters varied enough that we would have seen the parallels and still been able to differentiate between Castle and Beckett and Rook and Heat. And, given us the depth that can only be found in a novel.
After falling in love with Richard Castle on screen, I really wanted to read one of his books. I wanted to see what kept him on the best selling list for 26 books. I wanted to see the writing that Detective Beckett fell in love with and helped her heal after her mother's death.
Will I read the next one that comes out? Yep. I will. Mainly because I'm a weak weak woman who's fallen in love with this irrepressible novelist, and will take whatever scraps are pushed my way. I won't like myself because of it and will know that I'm settling, but alas, what's a girl to do?