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5.0 out of 5 stars
Delicious Nightmare, May 1 2009
One fateful night, Ashley Spencer is awakened by a noise. She is then tied up by a mysterious assailant who leaves her in her room and drags her best friend Tanya into the guest bedroom. Ashley can hear him as he rapes her friend savagely and then kills her. She thinks he is coming to kill her but he stops. Instead, he looks at her and says "See you later." He goes downstairs to get himself something to eat. Ashley can hear the plate hit the counter.
She finds her father, dying, in his bedroom. He was stabbed first and he crawls to Ashley. He dies with her and Ashley resolves to get away, lest her father's life be in vain. Escaping out of a window and running to safety, Ashley thinks that was the last she would see of the mysterious killer. She couldn't be more wrong.
Months later, Ashley's mother, away on the night of the attack, is killed while Ashley is attending the expensive and prestigious Oregon Academy. Another woman is found with her mother, Casey Van Meter, dean of the Academy. She is not dead but in a coma. Ashley witnessed the murder and saw writer in residence, Joshua Maxfield, holding a bloody knife over her mother's slain body. She rushes for help, and Maxfield is arrested. Finally, with Maxfield in custody, she has her freedom.
Again, she couldn't be more wrong. Maxfield escapes during the court case where it looks as if he is going to be sentenced. Running for her life, Ashley flees to Europe where she stays for five years before her return. But is Maxfield really guilty? Did he kill her mother and her friend? Why is he stalking her family? The answers to these questions will take her on a voyage of personal discovery and bring her face to face with a cold blooded killer...
This novel is as convoluted as it sounds. Normally I love Phillip Margolin novels. "Wild Justice" is one of my favorite suspense novels of all time, so I was eagerly waiting to read "Sleeping Beauty".
Unfortunately, I was left disappointed. Even from the very beginning, the dialogue in the book annoyed me; it felt fake and forced and made the novel a little difficult to read.
The plot was also way too convoluted for my taste. Though the book moves back and forth from the past to the present seamlessly, the plot was just too much to take sometimes. I know that authors depend on their readers to suspend disbelief for a certain amount of time, but with "Sleeping Beauty" that was asking too much. How could I possibly believe that Maxfield could escape his murder trial right in the middle of the case? How could Ashley actually get away from a killer cold blooded enough to kill her father and best friend so savagely? There were just too many wide gaping holes in the story for me to suspend my disbelief.
As well, I consider it the mark of a good writer if I'm unable to guess the identity of the killer. Usually I can't. I have never, ever guessed correctly in any mystery or thriller I have read, and I've read a lot of them. I was right on the button with this book. Who was it? I'm not telling. You have to read the book to find out.
Despite my problems with "Sleeping Beauty", it's still a pretty good read. It's not great, but it's a good read. If you want a good summer read, pick it up and enjoy. And don't have too many nightmares.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Nothing is What it Seems in this Dynamite Thriller, Jan 7 2008
The book opens with True crime writing attorney Miles Van Meter on a book tour. We see him as he slogs from town to town, promoting his book "Sleeping Beauty" which it the story of how serial killer Joshua Maxfield murdered Ashley Spencer's best friend and her parents, tried to kill his sister, leaving her in a coma and how he stalked Ashley, eventually getting caught as he tried to kill her.
Then we flash back to the crime as Miles reads from his book to a crowd in a bookstore. We see Ashley in bed as the killer breaks in, overpowers and binds her, then kills her friend who was sleeping over and her father. Fortunately he takes a break for a late night snack and Ashley's dad wasn't quite dead. He crawls into her room, frees her and she gets outta there. Also fortunately for Ashley's mother, she was away.
Ashley cannot go back to school, she is traumatized, but she is accepted into a private academy. Tess, Ashley's reporter mother is flattered when famous novelist, Joshua Maxfield, who is one of the teachers at the academy, asks her to join his writers group. At the first meeting of the group, Maxfield reads from a work in progress. It's a story about a serial killer who in the middle of his kills, takes a break for a snack. This is uncanningly like what happened when her husband had been killed and it is something only the police know. Tess investigates like the good reporter she is and she is killed.
The cops put extra protection on Ashley and they are killed and again she barely gets away with her life. She can't take it anymore and flees to Europe where she goes into hiding.
However, she comes back at the request of her attorney, who tells her that she'd been adopted and that she's an heiress, soon to be worth millions if that woman in a coma dies, because she's her biological mother. Ashley, it turns out, has been adopted.
And I'll leave it here, however I'd be remiss if I were to let you think that Ashley's troubles are over, they're just beginning in this book that has more twists and turns than there are stars in the sky. Well, not that many twists, but a lot, I was fooled, then fooled again. The red herrings were perfect, the characters believable and Mr. Margolin, as usual, has written just an outstanding mystery/thriller. I just loved it.
Review Submitted by Captain Katie Osborne
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Absorbing, Mar 25 2005
I absolutely love this novel. I have never read a book by this author before but something told me I must buy it. Thank heavens I did. It is a very absorbing, page turner that is very hard to put down once you start. I found his writing to be fascinating and each chapter left me wanting more. It had many twistes and turns that you never expect. I now will read all his other books and I will add him to my list of must read authors.
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