Double awful is more like it. It seems to be written for short attentions spans with 125 chapters and an epilogue in just over 8 hours. The "erotic" scenes are more like the imaginations of an adolescent boy and add nothing to the lame plot line. To make it worse, the readers are overly dramatic and their imitated accents are amateurish.

Don't waste your time!

As far as the audio book format goes, I love the way Patterson's Alex Cross stories are read, with one actor voicing the thoughts and words of Alex (Peter J. Fernandez is excellent as usual), and a second actor giving voice to the villain's. This works so well in the audio book format that I'm surprised I haven't heard more of this. I've heard quite a few mystery audio books, but the ones in the Alex Cross series seem to standout above the rest for for me for this reason.

James Patterson's greatest strength as a writer is also his greatest weakness. His villains are always wealthy, good looking, Harvard-educated, creative, and smarter than 10 Alex Crosses put together. The great thing about this is that you always know you are in Fantasy Land. His novels give me what I want from a work of fiction - a real escape from reality. When I listen to Patterson, I truly am in another world and all my troubles are forgotten while I contemplate Alex Cross's troubles. His books transport to you to Alex's world, and that's why there's the usual sense of withdrawal when the book finally comes to an end.

The best part of the Alex Cross mysteries is how creative the killers get. I don't think any other writer of murder-mystery fiction has taken the creativity of the bad guy as far as Patterson has. We're always going to be interested in what his villians are going to do next. In this way, his villains resemble over-the-top comic book bad guys. They may not have the costumes, but they do get the comic-book names, like "Casanova, The Mastermind, The Audience Killer," etc.

If you are looking for stories that have the real ring of "crime on the street" truth, then you can't do better than George Pelecanos or Michael Connelly for an unbeatable combination of gritty, believable realism and satisfying stories. But if you don't mind a little suspension of disbelief, Patterson can surprise you. I think he's one of the more creative writers working today.

James Patterson and Alex Cross return in top form. No double cross for readers this one. The villians are delightfully evil, Alex Cross is as we remember and Detective Brianna Stone holds her own throughout. I loved it!

No doubt being stuck on an airplane with this book will lower you IQ. I've read patterson books before, was I younger? Like it was written by a 12 year old, of courses a stupid 12 year old. Putting aside the inaccuracies, it's still a silly book that will leave you feeling duped if you make it through.

The beginning of the book started off with a bang..then the story started to unfold in an unrealistic manner. The killer changing his disguises so quickly to pull off his next murder seemed pointless in effect, as did the killers need to have an audience...I never got the 'why' part.

I am not one for cliffhangers either...the end of the book is completely open with the murderers in this story still alive and one of them still on the loose.