Saturday, November 27, 2010

Tell No One: A Book Review...

As much as I disparaged my wife for her poor film selection last week in making me watch Away We Go, so I must credit her with introducing me to this book.

She has picked it up at a local used book store and left it around the house while she was finishing up another novel.  I don't know why I picked it up, I usually have little to no interest in the books she reads which are mostly non-fiction accounts of drug users and/or abused children (that's what you get when you marry a Sociology major...).

This however was a great interlude in my more snobbish reading material.  Almost 400 pages in length, Tell No One reads about 1/2 that length as I chewed through it in the span of one afternoon and one evening.  You're not going to learn much here, nor are you going to remember the details...but you will be entertained.

If ever there was a summer/beach book primer, this one and I suspect this author, would be on the required reading.  The language is simple and cliche yet descriptive enough to feel like Coben isn't just throwing garbage down on the page while the plot takes numerous twists though none really unexpected.

The story revolves around a widowed pediatrician who carries a large amount of guilt regarding the murder of his wife some eight years earlier.  The good doctor one day receives a message on his computer that only his long dead wife would have known--and thus begins the trip down the rabbit hole that reveals numerous hidden truths about the doctor and his life.

In truth, this is the literary version of a Summer blockbuster.  Lots of lights, lots of action, lots of special effects and quite entertaining...just don't expect it to feed the soul.  If you just need to relax and enjoy some mindless entertainment this thriller will do the trick.

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