I had a little trouble keeping up my interest at the beginning of this story but the more I read the better it was. Towards the end I didn't want to put it down. Mainly, the story had to do with some computer people figuring out how to siphon off money from the drug cartel's money laundering acc...
This was my first foray into the life of Virgil Flowers and I must say I truly enjoyed the ride and can't wait to dig in to the rest of his stories. Virgil is a very likable and humble character that has a very laid back style, he likes the ladies and loves his boat and fishing. He's also a very ...
The Lucas Davenport series is pretty good. I've skipped around in it, and had no problem regarding background. The Minneapolis/St. Paul setting holds up nicely, except for one spot where Davenport was heading east toward St. Paul, and the next paragraph says he was still heading west. I would ...
I find the Lucas Davenport series rather dry and dull. This series by the same author is no better. Though I think the plot is a little better. Otherwise, it feels and reads just like a formula romance, where you change the name and the occupation and the location but the story is basically th...
This detective novel is about a well-organized, but brutal, criminal gang that attempts to rob the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, MN in 2008. It is quite realistic, IMO. The book contains very few editing errors, and only one minor inconsistency that I noted: The author asserts tha...
A Virgil Flowers book...the newer series spun off from the Davenport "Prey" series. Flowers is an investigator to whom Davenport assigns "only the hard cases." Virgil thinks he is off duty on a fishing trip, until a wealthy backer of the Governor is murdered in a nearby lake resort.Suspects aboun...
I am a huge fan of Lucas Davenport. . . . and John Sandford. I started reading the "Prey" mysteries a few years ago and have enjoyed reading every single one of them. I sail through these books usually in a couple of sittings. Absolutely love the wry comments from Minneapolis cop Lucas Davenpor...
Eleventh in the Lucas Davenport thriller series and revolving around a cop who will do what he must to get the right bad guy. This is set in Minnesota.My TakeIt's plain old police work on this, but Sandford spiffs it up with all the oddities: the drugs, the relationships between all the partiers,...
Twelfth in the Lucas Davenport thriller series and revolving around an unorthodox cop in Minneapolis. It's been a year since Easy Prey, 11.My TakeWhat I like about this series is that it's standard mystery/thriller reading, but Sandford's characters come out so real. That encounter between Luca...
This is possibly the last book in the Kidd/LuEllen series and I think the best so far. It has the Sanford writing I enjoy.Bobby has been brutally beaten and murdered in his home and his laptop is missing. As his close circle of hacker friends also known as “The Ring”, find out about his death, th...
Seventeenth in the Lucas Davenport series and revolving around a maverick detective determined on justice no matter how or who. It's based in Minneapolis.My TakeLucas Davenport is an interesting character. Definitely a complex one. I recently read that Sandford thought of him as a kind of sociopa...
If a CEO gets killed in the forest and no one is around to hear him fall, does he make a sound?Five top executives from a bank have gone into the woods on a deer hunting trip, but only four come out alive after someone tried to make a murder look like an accidental shooting. The dead man was the...
Second in the Lucas Davenport thriller series set in Minneapolis and revolving around Lucas Davenport. My TakeThis one is so disgusting. It makes me so angry that cops would abuse their power like this. It’s bad enough that any man would do this to a young girl, but for cops…it’s just worse…arghh...
Seventh in the Lucas Davenport thriller series based in Minneapolis.My TakeSandford sets the story so we’ll empathize when the action heats up. A sub plot is that ring Davenport keeps bouncing around, slipping on and off his finger, rumors are rife and the betting hot, lol. Sandford is just plain...
Fifth in the Lucas Davenport thriller series revolving around an ex-cop who misses the action. This story takes place in Grant, in northern Wisconsin, in the depths of winter.My TakeMan, another good one from Sandford. It’s terrifying how easy it is for someone like the Iceman to exist within a c...
Sixth in the Lucas Davenport thriller series set in Minneapolis and revolving around the reinstated Detective Davenport. It’s been two years since Lucas was forced to quit.My TakeGotta give Sandford credit for this twist: a detective who’s fired, goes off to build his successful gaming company, a...
This is number 16 in Sanford’s Prey series and one of the most complex to date. After Davenport’s successful attempt to break up a Russian spy ring in the last book, he is back to the brutal, violent and twisted killers, trying to solve horrific murders. Although Lucas had questions about his ...
I finally lost it for this book when the police officers murder an innocent man who was protecting his property. I'm pretty sure the cops weren't uniformed because they were undercover at the time. So the man didn't know they were cops when he shot at them in self defense.The cops flippant attitu...
Note, April 1, 2015: I updated this review slightly just now, to correct a typo (misspelled word).This tenth novel in Sandford's popular Prey series is my first experience with his work; usually, I prefer to read a series in order, but the friend who recommended this one felt (probably correctly)...
Fourth in the Lucas Davenport thriller series based in Minneapolis, and revolving around an ex-cop. This story takes place in New York City, two years after Eyes of Prey, 3, and fulfills the promise in its introduction *shudder*.My TakeThis is horrifying. Sandford sets the mood with the courtro...
This is the third book in the Kidd/LuEllen series and I admit, not one I really enjoyed.Kidd has been quietly working as an artist and making a decent living, but as he has gotten older, he has become fussier. This means his production is down and he is even choosier about what he sells to custom...
This is the first John Sandford book I've read - and I'm an instant fan! Sandford was recommended to my by a flight attendant in 2007 and also by fans of Dean Koontz looking for similar authors. I will probably start reading Sandford's Prey series but I wanted to try some of his stand alone nove...
Eighth in the Lucas Davenport thriller series based in Minneapolis.My TakeGeez, the cops are screwed if they try to follow the rules, and they’re screwed if they try to save lives. They caught the bank robbers, shouldn’t that cut some slack?? Yeah, and then there’s the other side. The cops who’ll...
First written by John Camp, John Sandford’s real name. It features Kidd and LuEllen as the two protagonists. Kidd is an artist, a software designer and a computer hacker. His specialty is getting into corporate computer systems and looking around. LuEllen likes to get into homes and look arou...
John Sandford is not all ‘Prey’ novels, ‘Flowers’ and Jack Davenport. He actually has another series that has not seen as many outings, but still holds up to scrutiny. The ‘Kidd’ novels surround a computer hacker/artist named Kidd who specialises in making money, but also dishing out a little s...
Not my favourite Sanford, by any means, but this is a question of personal taste. The storyline, in itself, is a gripping, fast paced and well recounted tale. So what didn't I like? I did not like the main character, on Jake Winter. He was a snivelling combination of outrageous and conflicting pe...
A widow comes home to her large house in a wealthy, exclusive suburb to find blood on the walls, no body — and her college-age daughter missing. She's always known that her daughter ran with a bad bunch. What did she call them — Goths? Freaks is more like it, running around with all that makeup a...
“A guy named Larry Royce, we’ve got his address and phone number, came in here and complained. We went right out there, four of us, but they were gone. I don’t know how long they were here, but I doubt that it was very long.” The complainant had given them a description of...
Lucas followed him, and they did find the jail, which was not much of a jail, more of a closet for people who wouldn’t be there long. A cop ushered them in, where blue-eyed Jesse Purdy was stretched out on a cot, looking not at all uncomfortable. He was reading a battered ...
She sniffed, and Shay caught it. “I know,” Shay said. “I need a shower.” “We’ve got time for a shower. I’ll dig you up some clothes, and we can get rid of those.” Shay looked down at herself. “Get rid of them? What’s wrong with them? I know I need to find a Laundromat.…” Emily said, “You look lik...
Becca rubbed her eyes, clutched her coffee, and stared at her half-eaten bagel as though it were a life preserver. She could use a life preserver: she was drowning in data. In this case, no news was bad news. She was no closer to figuring out why the reactor had shut itsel...
They’d spent the day before tramping around Broderick, talking with housewives and Calb employees, getting nowhere. The pitch Lucas had made to the sheriff’s deputies hadn’t produced anything yet, and Lucas began to wonder if he might be able to devise a way to pull the killer in. The problem was...
THE NUMBER of necessary killings was growing. There was no emotional problem there, but the risk had increased. Moonie recognized risk. Two of the remaining killings, Jerry Johnstone and Roman Schmidt, were matters of honor, simple as that. They were essential and inescapable and had already be...
Lucas cleaned up, put on khaki slacks, a black golf shirt and a sport coat, regulation black steeltoed uniform shoes, with the Model 40 in a shoulder rig.When he got downtown, he found Daniel in his office, cleaning off his desk, ready to go home. “What happened?” Lucas asked.“The chief had his p...
“You don’t need a court order for a public meeting,” the lawyer said. “I’m told they kick everybody out, saying that that meeting concerns personnel action,” Virgil said. “I was told that was an exception.” “Hmm. Yeah, it probably is. You got anythi...
“Six hours of hell,” Twist said to Shay as they drove away from Danny’s. “For you, anyway, because I plan to talk. You know, about your life, the way you dress, why most current art has no objective correlative, and so on.” Shay rolled her eyes, and he said, “Okay, I’ll keep it short: butt out of...
He was not hurting, but only because he’d taken so much oxycodone that he wouldn’t have felt anything less than an amputation. Yet something down there, in his groin, something vital felt like it was coming loose. Without the pills, he thought, he’d have felt like he’d just dropped his balls into...
He looked at the screen, which said it was two minutes after eleven o’clock, and “Caller Unknown.” “Hello?” “Don’t say anything. This is a wrong number. Look at your e-mail. Don’t call me back before tomorrow night.” Click. K...
While investigating a brutal murder in suburban Minnesota, Flowers discovers the killing is part of a series of murders of Vietnam veterans who all served together. Eric Congers gritty reading is perfectly suited to Sandfords literary world. His voice is at once serious and invigorating, drawing ...