Third Degree: A Novel by Greg Iles
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Book Reviews of Third Degree: A Novel
Book Review: I liked it, not sure why other reviews are lower than normal....
Summary: 4 Stars
Iles continues to write great books. They are fast paced, fun to read and I can't wait for the next one. Where this one ranks, I am not sure, I have read them all and they are all good.Book Review: Unforgiving ... In more ways than one.
Summary: 3 Stars
Laurel Shields's day turns into a nightmare from the moment she got out of bed. First, an E.P.T. Pregnancy test turns out positive, her husband had never came to bed and seems frantic while trashing the great room. Obviously, he's looking for something. What, she doesn't know. The problem is: she doesn't know who the father is. Her husband Warren's, or Danny McDavitt, the man with whom she'd had a year-long affair with that recently ended.
Even though she feels a migraine coming on, she still goes to the school where she teaches special needs children. Her migraine becomes full-blown when it's Danny who shows up for the parent-teacher meeting, not his wife.
She returns home for medication for her migraine only to have her husband confront her. Seems he found a letter, hidden in one of her favourite classic books, from an unknown man. She denies it, but he doesn't believe her. Now a gun comes into the picture, and Warren is now holding her hostage, determined to find out who she was having an affair with.
Meanwhile, Warren has a secret he's been keeping from Laurel. He's sick, and there's nothing that can be done about it. And he's known about his condition for a little over a year. And to boot, the IRS is coming to audit him and his partner, Kyle Auster. Seems Auster has been defrauding the government, and while Warren kept his business out of it, he'd started partaking, when he found out about his condition.
Things escalate from there.
This is the first Greg Iles novel I've read. Some reviews are saying it's by far not his best work. What do I say to that? Thank God! Maybe I'll give him another go.
It felt like a bad scene from a made-for-TV-movie, where everything gets out of hand in a big hurry.
Yes, Laurel finds out she's pregnant. She's positive that Danny is the father. Meanwhile, while Warren holds her hostage, all he wants to know is for her to admit to her affair and who the man is. But she denies it - denies it right up until the end - even when the proof is flashed between the three of them.
The whole scenario, within a what, 8-hour span, was blown way out of proportion. You get to understand why, because of steroid use and unexplained bouts of anger and violence are a side effect. But until you find that out, it just seems to drag.
It gets to be repetitive, and in some places, information, details and explanations are drawn out and are unnecessary. Bad enough that I started skimming pages to get passed explanations that had absolutely nothing to do with the situation. For the first time I read anything by this author, that, from me, is considered a bad sign.
And the characters... good lord, where do I start? I was upset with Laurel right from the beginning. No matter how bad a marriage is, there is no excuse to stray. If you aren't in love anymore, it's called DIVORCE! Sit down and talk to your spouse. Lack of communication upsets me greatly - because there is no excuse for it (I do hope that I don't offend anyone ~ that's my opinion, with a story of fiction or not, cheating on your spouse, to me, is unexcusable)! Warren: I can understand his excuses for not telling anyone about his cancer. I'm sure I'd feel the same way. But again, if he doesn't want anyone to know, that's fine, but as his wife and mother of his children, she had a right to know what was going on. And then he drags the children into the middle of their fight - lucky I can't jump into a book; [...]
Vera and Auster are completely selfish with utter lack of any morals whatsoever. [...] I hate finding it in a book, fiction or otherwise. Some of the cops shouldn't even be cops, let alone part of the county's SWAT team. Danny seemed to be the only one worth his salt. He tried to talk Warren down, tried to get him to understand that, no matter what Laurel did, whether she cheated or not, it's still no excuse for the way he's acting. Tried to get him to stop. Even though he was lying to Warren himself, that was the smallest of indiscretions that didn't bother me. He was trying to stop anyone else from getting killed, period.
The biggest problem, for me, with this book was the repetitiveness and the unnecessary details. It made the book drag. It wasn't until the second half of the book where the story really started to get interesting.
Book Review: Twenty-four hours of non-stop thrills
Summary: 3 Stars
I just finished Third Degree and my feelings about this are mixed. I have been a huge Greg Iles fan. But this book is different to say the least. To begin with there are really only three characters whereas as some of Iles' books have many, many characters. The subject matter at first does not seem to have the depth of many of his other books, e.g. "True Evil". And there is not as much sheer terror as you may find in some of the earlier books. But this is well written. The subject at first seems to be marital discord and infidelity. One of the main characters has had an affair and within the first few pages learns that she is pregnant. Her lover cannot leave his wife without risking losing his handicapped son to his worthless wife. The lover who is pregnant is also the special ed teacher who has the handicapped child in her class. Her husband is a doctor whose partner seems to have taken the business down a path that has brought a federal investigation down on their heads. So where does the trouble lie? Iles throws a very unusual twist in the last 100 pages that ties everything together. I liked that. But you also have scenes where you go from a tense scene in a suburban home to a battlefield in Afghanistan just by turning the page. Too confusing. And when one character sets a helicopter down on the sidewalk of the house it is too contrived. All the action takes place in less than 24 hours and almost all of it is within the confines of the house. But this part is well constructed and works. I recommend that you read it if you are an Iles fan. But if you are not, start with his earlier books first because if you begin with this one you will not know how great a writer he can be.Book Review: Iles trademark formula - but missing the magic
Summary: 3 Stars
This passes as an acceptable thriller - but only because Iles still uses his standard formula of time-constrained tension (in fact, it all pretty much occurs in a day), combined with a unique premise, a couple of red herrings and some surprising actions based on the character's personality. All which result in an "I can't put it down" type book.
This one lends itself to more to stereo-typical characters and stretches believability. After the first half I picked it up in smatters just so I'd know the ending, before I tossed it.
The first book I read by Iles was 24 Hours. In this genre, to me, that one was worth five stars for it's premise, plotting and roller-coaster tension. If you're a first time Iles reader that's the one to go for.
Book Review: Not up to par
Summary: 3 Stars
Greg Iles' latest novel is not up to the quality of his earlier works. This story moves quickly, and there is tension and a number of twists, but even the rich backdrop of the story doesn't make this one a winner.
My problem with the story is the main character. We are introduced to the protagonist while she is in the midst of discovering the fallout from her marital affair. Already the story had an obstacle I would have to struggle to overcome. The infidelity adds a touch of humanity and realism in a character, I admit, but there was no effort to paint the wife and her actions as particularly sympathetic. When the author paints in the picture to make her more so later, I had already determined that I did not connect with her.
The quality of Iles' writing and pacing was lost when I started out disliking the main character.