Jacob Stone

I love a prologue that hooks me. Like the title, this one only hinted at the ugliness to come.

The Nightmare Man makes a grisly appearance.

Lori was at the shelter, looking for a big dog. A voice kept whispering in her head, warning her that evil was coming for her. She feels it and she is terrified. I didn’t see what was coming. I love when I am fooled early on. Just goes to show, it doesn’t matter how many books I read, I don’t know it all.

Morris had quit the LAPD when a serial killer almost claimed him as a victim. He formed an investigative agency and took some of his fellow officers with him…along with a handful of cold case files that he couldn’t let go. Morris has an instinct and a knack for catching serial killers. He is often hired by the city to lead the investigation, and they come to him now.

Morris’s wife, Natalie, is a trained therapist, so it’s hard to keep anything from her.

I love Parker, his dog. He is a bull terrier, not the most handsome guy around. You know, one of those so ugly he’s cute guys. Morris takes him everywhere he goes. He is a bit rude, a little overweight, but loyal.

My first meeting with Nightmare Man caused chills to run up and down my spine. I am given just a glimpse of the gruesome and deadly evil that has descended on the town.

October 2 is rapidly approaching. It had been seventeen years since the last killings that took place over seventeen days. There are more grisly ways the Nightmare Man uses seventeen, but I can’t tell you everything, because even I don’t know what they all are…yet.

Morris’ investigation leads him to the mob and the mystery becomes even more dangerous and complicated. Morris has no choice, a deal is struck.

Oh man…I am bummed. I’m at 30% and I sure didn’t see that coming. Now I know the worst. It is sickening, brutal, savage. What a frickin’ awful surprise! Jacob Stone doesn’t mind killing off his characters and I had grown fond of that one. Oooo, it gets even more depressing. But, it’s about a serial killer. It’s supposed to be terrible.

It’s getting awfully intense and action packed. I keep waiting for the next hirrible thing to happen. I am only halfway through and I can only imagine the horrors I’m going to endure to get to the villain. And that is too kind of a word for the evil and insidious menace hanging on every word, every page, every chapter.

The second half of the book flashes back to the previous appearances of the Nightmare Man, back to 1984. 2001. I had wondered how the search could go on that long, but we go back and find out why they never caught him the first time around. Or the second. They will catch him now…but questions still remain.

I voluntarily reviewed a free copy of Cruel by Jacob Stone.

See more at http://www.fundinmental.com… (meer)

Cruel by Jacob Stone
Morris Brick Thriller #4

Serial killer mysteries are not everyone’s cup of tea but for some reason I do enjoy such stories once in a while. I also like to read a wide variety of authors and genres and at this time I was ready for a new-to-me author and a murder mystery with an edge – this book happens to be the one that came my way.

Not having read the first three books in the series makes me wonder if those who have are more in tune with Morris, his family and the people he works with. I found him an interesting character though rather laid back and less communicative than I might have liked…wanted to know him better than I did by the end of the book. That said, I learned that he loves his wife and daughter and dog, Parker. He has good men that he works with that are also good friends that joined him when he left the police force. He is invested in solving cases and it seems he is called in to consult with the police from time to time though most of his work sounded to be mundane private investigator type work. That said…he seems to be one who has managed to catch more than one serial killer that has come into his neighborhood.

In this book there is a rather demented person on the loose - a person that kills every seventeen years and does so in a depraved and painful way…painful for the person who dies anyway. The first group of murders occurred in 1984 when Morris was young and his father was assigned the case. The second set of murders occurred in 2001 and Morris was a young man on the police homicide team looking for the killer. As this story begins it is nearing the time for a third round of murders to occur and Morris is concerned – and rightly so.

The mystery is ongoing...
* Who is the murderer?
* Why are the murders occurring as they do?
* Is there symbolism or reason behind the murders?
* Is there only one person killing people?
* Why every seventeen years?
* Will they catch the murderer in 1918 or not?

So, Morris steps in and leads a team of his investigators and some of the police force in hopes of finding the killer before he finishes killing the five women slated to die. As murders begin clues also start to trickle in. When all is said and done…it is a story that is different than most I have read before in this genre. There was torture and enough written about it to know how horrible the experience was for the person who dies without actually having to live through each moment with her. There were not really any suspects to speak of at first though there were hunches from time to time. There was eventually a connection made that provided a tip that that lead to the first concrete steps in figuring out the puzzle of the Nightmare Man but it wasn’t until nearly the end that all the pieces were put together.

I have mixed feelings on this one. I never really identified with Morris and am not sure why. And, I wonder again if I had read from book one if that might be different. I liked the women that were murdered and wished they had not died and perhaps that is a sign of a good writer and writing style to so invest the reader in the murdered. I also worried about a dog that went missing and hoped it ended up okay. In the end I did enjoy the book enough to read another one but it did not grab me, make me love Morris and end the book eagerly waiting for the next book to come out. Perhaps that is in part due to the gruesome nature of the murders and my hope that nobody else like the Nightmare Man will show up again.

An aside – with so many serial murderers around in books and on television shows I wondered how many there are actually are out there AND I learned that a person who kills two (I thought it was three or more) is considered a serial murderer so there are no doubt more serial killers around than I thought AND interestingly enough there is a good possibility that there are more on the loose than there are that have been captured…creepy to think about isn’t it?

Thank you to NetGalley and Kensington Books-Lyrical Underground for the ARC – This is my honest review.

3-4 Stars… (meer)

This book is part of a series of books that feature Morris Brick. Yet, it reads as a stand alone novel. I did like Brick. He showed intelligence and could lead a team. From what I read, I did like this book and do want to get to know Brick better.

In regards, to the killings, they were gruesome. Yet, not a lot of time was spent in great details. Therefore, anyone who is a bit skirmish about gore could handle reading this book. Ok, so I admit that I didn't see the plot twist. This is a good thing as I enjoy a book that can surprise me; especially mystery books.

The only reason that I didn't give this book five stars is because most of the other characters while fine were not as up t par as Brick's character. Thus at times I felt the story dragged in parts. Overall, I did like this book and would read more books from this author.… (meer)