Customer Reviews

Hit List

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
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Hit List has so many twists and turns it is sure to be a great read for anyone! An avid reader, I can usually figure the book out in the first three chapters. Not so with Hit List. This book kept me up reading until late in the night, then tying everything up with a blockbuster ending. If you read one book this year, make Hit List that book!!!

Hit List is a thrilling story of suspense, intrigue and crime. Author Darcia Helle weaves an elaborate plot of murder, mental illness, passionate love and crooked cops. Revolving around a woman who is believed to be psychotic, Hit List is replete with action, anxiety and adventure. Helle carries the reader through a chilling escapade of crime, conspiracy, passion and homicide.

Ian's mother, Corrine, chanting and rocking, sometimes catatonic, appears to suffer from mental illness. She presents all of the mannerisms of psychosis and paranoid schizophrenia. Corrine's apparently irrational fears and free-floating anxiety seem to be the result of a ravaging psychosis. Or, are they? Only her son, Ian, believes that something might be amiss. He hires a beautiful, vivacious private investigator, Lucianna, to resolve the unanswered, bothersome questions. But, Ian soon finds himself infatuated with the voluptuous private eye.

Lucianna, gruff and all business on the outside, is fragile and vulnerable on the inside. Plagued by the murder/suicide of her own parents, Lucianna is compelled to determine the truth in the case of Corrine. All the while, she is drawn in by the allure of Ian. Something disturbing, deep within the story, draws Lucianna to the case. As she becomes emotionally involved with Ian, the two characters are enveloped first with passion and later with love. Surrounded by treachery and fear, they draw upon each other for strength. Add to the mix, a shady psychiatrist named Endicott, unethical, eavesdropping cops and a crime organization, bent upon eliminating anyone with potential knowledge of their illicit efforts.

Helle's effort is compelling, thrilling fiction, with persuasive mystery, convincing characters, ubiquitous trepidation, and a breathtaking conclusion. This tale is wrapped together into a taught package of excitement and intrigue. Helle has created a powerful page-turner, with gripping tension; it contains a gripping timeline and malevolent criminals eager to prey upon an innocent man's mother.

Helle creates masterful scenarios with engrossing dialog to weave a frightening tale fraught with continuous peril. This novel flies along with engrossing and entertaining dialog. Just when you begin to believe that you comprehend the plot, there is a twist or turn carrying the rapt reader in a different direction.

While some authors create vibrancy via description, Helle uses dialog to carry the story forward. She accomplishes this with exceptional writing and imagination. Helle is masterful in storytelling via dialog.

Hit List is a fast-paced, suspenseful adventure, compelling the reader to continue turning the pages. Helle's character formation is top notch, with vibrant context, exceptional dialog and a moving narrative. This is a book difficult to put down.

Congratulations to Helle for her captivating detective story. One can only anticipate the cinematic appearance of this frightening, entertaining yarn.

Charles S. Weinblatt

Author, Jacob's Courage: A Holocaust Love Story

Like everybody else, I have my favorite detective novel authors: Dan Brown, Anne Stuart, Robert B. Parker (only his first 10-12 books or so), Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, Robert Crais, Michael Connelly, James Lee Burke, David Baldacci, Christine Feehan and a few others.

Those among you familiar with these authors can appreciate the mastery with which they craft their books. Most of the books written by them would get 10 out of 10 from me.

When I started reading "Hit List" by Darcia Helle, I quickly realized that this book is placing very high on my list. While no one can come close to Agatha Christie, James Lee Burke and Conan Doyle, she was standing tall right next to Robert Crais, Michael Connolly, Anne Stuart, Christine Feehan and Robert B. Parker.

It was definitely better than "Silver Falls", the last book by Anne Stuart, and right behind her famous Ice Series. Better than everything Parker wrote in the last seven years, and holding its own against Baldacci, Connelly and Sandra Brown.

The story is so well written, and it keeps you guessing until the very end. The characters are literary marvels, no clichés here. Dialogue is authentic, pace is great, there are little smart observations on life scattered throughout the text that make you think you and the author are old pals trading remarks about life over coffee.

My favorite part of it all is the plot: A woman living alone one day goes crazy! The parts of the book that we see out of her head are the best! Her grown son moves in to help take care of her. He resents it somewhat, it is hard to see mom reduced to a drooling idiot, but then it strikes him: What if she is not crazy? What if someone is really out to get her, watching her, planning revenge? He hires a private investigator Lucianna to find out..... the story skyrockets from there.

It is a great read, very well put together, full of unexpected twists and turns. I see bestseller stamped all over this one!!!!!!!!!!!

Congratulations to the author on such a stunning beginning of her writing career.

This author is putting some fresh new twists into her stories. Can't wait for more! Definitely a great read!

This book starts where mother seems to be losing her mind, forcing her son to move back home and wonder if he should put her into an institution. How can a parent go from "normal" to a babbling child hiding in a closet in just one day? Follow Ian along while he tries to save his mother, with therapists and a private detective agency. Trust me; this book takes you places you never expect to go. There are surprises all the way to the end. This is the first book of Darcia Helle I have read, and I promise you it is not the last! Pick this one up, you will not be disappointment.

Although there's a little more violence than I usually like in my mysteries, this is still a great read! The plotting is WONDERFUL. Every time I think I know what to expect, Ms. Helle adds a new twist that takes me by surprise. Once I got into this book, I couldn't put it down!

Hit List if full of surprising plot twists and nerve racking suspense. Even though alternating between several different viewpoints, it was not confusing or irritating and served to further the plot and develop the characters. Ian's love for his mother was touching and I liked the fact that he refused to institutionalize her, but instead did everything he could to help her and to find out what caused her sudden insanity. Lucianna was a great character, smart and funny, and I liked how her relationship with Ian progressed. The author built the suspense slowly and everything was finally revealed in the end. Great dialogue, very realistic, excellent plot (there is a bit of language and some references to child prostitution, which is part of the part and is not explicit). I really hope there are more Lucianna stories in the future; especially with her Uncle Vinnie and his friends - they really know how to close a case.

The multi-dimensional characters in Darcia Helle's Hit List pulled me into the story immediately. They held their grip on me through all the twists and turns and refused to let go until the very last page. I can't wait to read more of her books.

This is a book I did not need a bookmark for, I couldn't put it down.

A thoroughly enjoyable ride, if you enjoy crime stories. It had a good plot line that was slowly revealed throughout the storyline, leaving mysteries to discover all the way till the last pages. A sweet romance is slowly woven into the action and doesn't feel out of place. A modern psychological thriller, good to the last page. Highly recommended.

"They were outside today. I saw them. I saw them. I saw them outside today." Corinne McCormick mumbles insanity such as this from her huddled place underneath the table, unable to break free even with the help of her son Ian and her psychiatrist, Dr. Endicott. Something in her panic, and the inability of Dr. Endicott to cure her, brings Ian to the illogical but desperate conclusion to hire a P.I. and see if there is truth to his mother's ramblings. Are "they" out there, watching her?

Enter Lucianna Martel, owner of Martel Investigations, which is run with the help of her ex-cop uncle Vinnie. She and Ian embark on a trail of twists, misinformation and kidnapping while, one by one, people surrounding the mystery wind up dead from a professional hit. A family secret, so horrible and so debauched, has created a monster seeking revenge, a monster who is drawing closer and closer. Can Ian and Lu save Corinne's life before the killing continues?

This fast-paced page turner will be hard to put down. The fact that a love story weaves its way through the plot only makes it even more interesting. Kudos to Ms. Helle for a job well done!