Customer Reviews

Hoax

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(31)

 

 

Those in the know have known for a long time that the real talent behind Tanenbaum's Butch Karp books has been Michael Gruber. Like many of the reviewers here I knew that Gruber had gone out on his own after a split with Tanenbaum, and like them I was willing to give the name on the cover a chance to prove his own talent. I'm sorry to say I was disappointed. From the first page it is abundantly clear that the style has suffered, and Butch Karp has hit the skids. The question is now, did Tanenbaum do any of the writing or plotting of the early Karp novels, or is he only a front man? The quick answer may indeed be, yes.

Butch and his vigilanty wife have slowly become annoying, cloying and just too predictable. It is time to put them away and explore new fields, "Hoax" has rung the death knell for a once interesting pair of characters and plots that made sense and writing that galluped with tension and drama.

"Hoax", as the title, is obviously a pun. The Karp series has been a gigantic "hoax" and now the truth is revealed. To be sure, do what I did and check out Michael Gruber's first novel with his name on the cover, "Trpic of Night", and you'll get the joke. Gruber was the masyermind, the talent - the "writer" all along. For the same kind of former great read just look for a different name on the cover and a new, more vibrant hero named, Paz.

Tanenbaum, Karp, etal are history and that is too bad we say good bye to an old friend and hello to a new, more interesting series by the true master, Michael Gruber.

I have been a faithful and devoted reader of Tanenbaum's books for a long time. He was the one thriller writer whose books I would pounce on and buy (or beg or borrow or steal) without even bothering to read the blurb on the inside flap.

Imagine my surprise when I started reading this newest Tanenbaum, only to discover that it was, apparently, a counterfeit. Within a few pages I had the eerie sensation that though the characters had familiar names, they were simply not the same people I had come to know and love. And the style! Yikes! One of the great pleasure of a Tanenbaum novel has always been the clever repartee, the tongue-in-cheek wit, the terrific use of irony. Lo and behold, all had disappeared from sight. Instead, what I found was clumsy and--dare I say it--amateurish writing that should never have seen the light of day. Marlene, my all-time favorite character in any thriller, has turned from a stylish, smart, sassy New Yorker to a rather boring and wooden two-dimensional parody of herself. Butch is reduced to maundering about the past. The kids are mere shadows of their former selves, and the plotting, sequencing, and dialogue are not worthy of a high-school creative writing class.

So I quickly concluded that Tanenbaum must have hired a ghost to churn this one out. Then I learned from the Internet, to my horror, that all the wit and pizzazz of the earlier books had been due to the REAL writer, Michael Gruber, who had a parting of the ways with the fake writer, whose only claim to fame is that his name is in fact Robert Tanenbaum. He may be a decent lawyer, I don't know, but he is no writer. So the problem is not that Tanenbaum HIRED a ghost, it's that the real writer of the old Tanenbaums finally came to his senses and struck out on his own.

Wow. I feel betrayed. This is SO Milli Vanilli. Don't buy this book unless you are teaching a class in creative writing and ethics and need an example of how NOT to do things. Otherwise, just figure that Butch and Marlene and Lucy and Zak and Giancarlo and Guma and all the other wonderful, complex, brilliant characters died on 9/11. Mourn their loss, and then start reading Gruber's books.

I have read every single Butch & Marlene novel and always eagerly await the release of the next chapter in their saga. Alas, this may be their final chapter for me. Gone are the brilliantly drawn and interesting characters, the sarcastic banter, the exciting twists and turns, leaving pages of needless detail and outlandish resolutions. After reading about Lucy and the cliff I closed my book and have yet to reopen it. Please, Mr. Tanenbaum, pay Michael Gruber whatever you have to and bring him back. Your new co-author can write, but he can't write Butch and Marlene as we all know and love them!

I have been a devoted fan for many years and I have to say Hoax is simply dreadful. There may be material for a good book there, but it did not materialize. And the characterisation of the Karp family is so bad it makes you cringe.

I thought at the time that The Resolved would be the last book of the series. What a pity that it was not.

Michael Gruber's genius is sorely missed.

I've read every one of the books in this series, but this is the last one unless I see an acknowledgment to Mr. Gruber in the next one.

Memo to Mr. Tanenbaum: Too many sentences starting with "However". That's a stylistic no-no. Too many characters purring, pouting, lamenting, sulking, growling, hissing, grousing, grumping, sniffing their words. Just have them say or ask the dialog. Too many chortles. One does not "pour" over maps. It's a murder of _crows_, not cows. Here's Guma after someone insults him: "'Hey, I resemble that,' Guma lamented." Way lame.

The characters aren't even in character in this book. They just aren't the same people.

The hoax may be on us. Some of us got conned into buying this book. If this had been the first one in the series, I would never have bought the second.

I have been a huge fan of the Butch Karp - Marlene Ciampi series. I've read every novel more than once. So I happily paid top dollar for a hard cover for a book I assumed I would thoroughly enjoy. I was sadly disappointed.

Tanenbaum forgets crucial details about his returning characters. (Where is Lucy's deep religious faith?) His new characters are caricatures (shy cowboy, fiendish serial killer, corrupt priest). He makes errors of fact. (Sarah, not Rachel, was Abraham's wife.) He tells far too much of the story in flashbacks. It slows the pace and weakens the suspense.

Earlier reader reviews mention the absence of co-writer Michael Gruber. I conclude it's Mr. Gruber, not Mr. Tanenbaum, who gave the series its power. I'm not plunking down $26 again without checking the credits carefully.

Wow, I was so looking forward to this book! I love this series and these characters. But this book was a huge disappointment! Now that I read above that a new uncredited writer replaces the previous one, I guess I know why.

Hoax is so poorly written it simply can't be from the same pen that wrote the early books in the series. The characters and dull and flat and totally without any emotional reality. For most of the book, the author simply tells us what the charcter thinks or feels in a very passive voice. Some of the newly introduced characters are stock stereotypes, or wildly unrealistic characters straight out of melodrama. Some of our old favorite characters behave very differently than we have known them to behave. Butch goes out drinking in a tavern till 3 a.m. A virtually unrecognizable Tran appears, empire intact, while in the last book he lives in exile. Lucy doesn't pray. The dogs don't even appear until the book's end, and they never seem to need walking. Guma's back at work, despite the fact that in previous books he's retired and afflicted with cancer.

The book employs an annoying flash-back device that, I assume, is intended to make it more thrilling, but it simply adds to the sense of distance one feels from events and characters.

Action scenes, when they are presented, are curiously flat and stale. A scene of a multiple murder in a warehouse is at once so predictable (I saw the denouement coming a mile away!) and yet so gutless one has to go back and re-read it to realize the killings occured. Marlene presumably involves herself in some of the intrigue, but we are simply told this, we are never presented with a scene of her interacting with the bad guys. In fact, she and Lucy are set up to be assassinated by a character that they never even encounter --- I'm puzzled how he even knows who they are, the way the story is told.

The various rationales for advancing the plot rely far too much on coincidence and other unlikely motives. Can one really believe that framing a specific Latino kid is the obsession of the most powerful villian in New York? Can one really believe that the bad guys decided to kill Marlene just because a third party relates that she's been nosing around in a distant location?

I laughed out loud --- and this was hardly the writer's intent --- during a scene involving Lucy and a lasso --- I won't spoil it for anyone, but let's just say that this is the definative moment when this series jumped the shark for me.

I guess all good things have to come to an end. I will re-read old Butch and Marlene novels if I ever need another fix with these characters, but forget about Hoax. It's aptly named.

As a big fan of the earlier Robert K. Tanenbaum novels (or, perhaps more accurately, the Michael Gruber novels), might I say here: blech.

This is possibly the most artless piece of pap imaginable. What makes it so infuriating is that the earlier books were so enjoyable and readable--despite the absurdly far-fetched plot lines. Here, not only is the writing a festival of telling instead of showing (it feels like a self help book in that regard), it seems that the editor is completely asleep at the switch--if there even was an editor. (The good ones don't let stuff like this get past the BS filter.)

If you want to read Butch Karp, back up to the earlier work. This is one destined for the shredder.

I did not know anything about Tanenbaum using a ghost writer until I read the reviews on this site. I read "Reversible Error" about ten years ago, but nothing else credited to Tanenbaum. I am only halfway through this and scratching my head as to why there is no cohesion to this novel. I don't think I've ever read anything so full of meandering fluff as this book! I gave it two stars only because there have been a few chapters that have held my interest fairly well, although they eventually get lost in the haze that appears to comprise much of this story. It's also loaded with very awkwardly constructed sentences. How did it slip by the editor?

The rating of 1 was clearly given only out of loyalty to the outstanding efforts of Michael Gruber and the development of the characters, particularly Marlene and Butch, whom we have enjoyed consistently in 15 earlier novels spanning at least as many years. With all due respect to Mr. Tanenbaum, as it is our understanding he had the ideas for the stories that Mr. Gruber put into ink, it is clear in Hoax that he doesn't know his characters very well, nor can he construct a plot as effectively as Mr. Gruber.

Of particular mention is the characterization of Butch, that despite the occasional drink, would never be sitting at the kitchen table with glass of wine in hand. For loyal readers the greatest disappointment is the characterization of Tran, a former leader of men, philosopher and protector of the Karp family, as a cheap opportunist actually soliciting them for monetary recompense for his services. Previously a cut above the common thug, with his conflicted past and undying loyalty to Marlene and Lucy, he has sunk to undesirable levels in conflict with the character we came to love despite his twisted morality. The question that begs to be asked over and over is: would our Tran do such a thing? or would our Tran have such a fragile hold over his own organization to need to lower himself to such a level in order to maintain his leadership status? The answer to both questions is an unequivocal 'NO.'

Gone forever is the witty repartee, unless it is of a sexual nature between Murrow and Stupe ad nauseam. Gone are the believable characters as in, despite whatever one believes regarding politicians, a sociopath running for office, issuing assassinations at will (among other things) is inexcusable and, for Tanenbaum/Gruber fans, insulting to our intelligence. Gone was the interesting spiritual undercurrent and internal struggle of the characters, which has now given way to such appalling attempts at deep Indian philosophy such as Jojola saying to Marlene `maybe things happen to cause an ending we can't know yet'... duh?

We would, however, also like to take this opportunity to personally thank the Gruber/Tanenbaum team for years of truly enjoyable entertainment. We will miss them.