Most helpful customer reviews
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3.0 out of 5 stars
If you like this author, you'll love this book, Feb 17 2008
Darcy and Erin have a friend who's doing research on the kind of people who place personal ads; they're helping her by answering some personals and going out on dates. Erin chooses one where the man signs himself, "Loves music, loves to dance" and he does, but he's also a serial killer.
This is my third Mary Higgins Clarke novel and it follows her exact formula: A beautiful heroine is stalked by a perverted psycho. She's involved with a bunch of red herrings who could all be the baddie and we won't know the villain's true identity until the last few pages, when our damsel is rescued by Prince Charming.
Clark's books are quick reads, good for the beach or a plane trip, but way too predictable and poorly written for me to read anymore of them. There are too many characters to keep track of, we're given way too much useless information about them, the dialog is full of grandiose words and phrases that aren't realistic, and we know the heroine will solve the mystery in the end. I like this book's title and the idea of a killer finding his victims through personals, but it's just not very well done.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Girls Should Never Look for Guys in the Personals, Mar 16 2004
Erin and Darcy have been friends since childhood. They are best friends who do almost everything together. Erin is a jewellery designer who has just landed a job that will make her career. Darcy is an interior designer with a flourishing business.When a friend asks them to help her gather data for a televison program she's doing on dating from the personals, the girls agree. After all, it would be fun, answereing a few ads, going out on a few dates. A lark. And then Darcy doesn't come back from one of the dates. Her body is discovered with a dancing shoe on one foot. Erin decides to date the same men as her friend had, hoping she'll find out who the killer is. However, Darcy wasn't the first victim the killer found though a personal ad and, to his way of thinking, she won't be the last, because now he has his sights set on Erin. It's always been a mystery to me how anyone can believe what they read in these ads. People lie. I mean you could be going out with a serial killer, as Darcy did, or with a rapist, or the very least, probably someone who is stepping out on his wife. Anyway, one thing is guaranteed for sure, if you read this book, you won't be answering any ads from the Sunday paper, or any other paper either. That said, I couldn't put this one down, it's a super thriller.
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3.0 out of 5 stars
Pretty good plot story, characterization needs work., Mar 1 2004
I don't usually pick up Mary Higgins Clark mysteries, but it was late at night and this was readily available in my daughter's room. This was a better read then some of her other books I've come across. The plot was good. I've known and suspected that meeting people via the Internet is not the safest way to go. Too many predators out there. Clark did not make use of the concept enough...just used Internet like newspaper ads for singles. Many times people will talk to another person for months, even years before meeting them in person...and this could have been used more in the story.My big complaint again is character development. I don't know where Clark gets the idea that describing the fancy clothes her characters wear is character development, but that seems to be what she is doing. I guess her books are trying to straddle genres here, being part mystery and part romance. Apparently the female characters also need to find someone 'right' to love in these books also. Ok, enough nitpicking. For a quick read that demands no effort on the part of the reader this book is fine. Even I get tired of the science and bioethics books, and need a mindless break once in a while. :-) Karen Sadler
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