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DOUBLE VISION
by Colby Marshall
Berkley, April 2015
354 pages
$15.00
ISBN: 042527652X


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

In spite of its flaws, DOUBLE VISION manages to keep the reader's interest and attention. In this second in the Dr. Jenna Ramey series, after DOUBLE BLIND, Jenna responds to a mass murder at a grocery store during which seven customers were killed. One of the witnesses is Molly, a savant who sees the world through numbers. Jenna is immediately drawn to the young girl, as Jenna sees the world differently, too; rather than numbers, Jenna processes emotions and events as colors. Throughout the investigation, Jenna keeps returning to Molly to gather further information about the numbers associated with the murders. In the end, it is Molly's insights that connect this murder of seven people to an open case concerning the Triple Shooter who kills women with a connection to the number three.

While Jenna is involved in finding the Triple Shooter and the psychopath who is apparently using him as a tool, her lover, Yancy, (who is a 911 call processor) becomes entangled in a situation involving a battered woman. He compromises himself in that case and, as the two cases move inexorably toward one another, his unwillingness to tell Jenna what he's done threatens to derail her case. There are several complex plot lines at play in this book, and there's a bit of manipulation on the part of the author to make them all join at the end. Nonetheless, they entertain and keep the reader engaged.

The book could have used a bit of editing. Marshall has a tendency to build overly complex sentences, causing the reader to stop and return to make sense of the writing. An example: "And even if I can't figure out what god he's hearing, maybe I can find some connection in the crimes to either make the random murdering of seven people, instead of one who aligned with threes, make sense to give me a more accurate profile of the shooter, or to link the victims in some way I haven't seen yet and keep working with the current profile based on similarities of victims instead of focusing on the number of them." I have a suspicion that there are at least a couple of sentences in there, and trying to decipher what Jenna is attempting to say in this one complex sentence jars the reader out of the story. This happens at various points in the book, weakening the suspense.

In the end, most of the various plot lines are resolved. However, the author relies upon a couple of important unresolved mysteries to entice the reader to pick up the next in the series. I would prefer that she use the strengths of the present book to assure readers that the next will be just as fine rather than trying to manipulate the reader into picking up the third Dr. Jenna Ramey novel.

§ Sharon Mensing is the Head of School of Emerald Mountain School, an independent school in the mountains of Colorado, where she lives, reads, and enjoys the outdoors.

Reviewed by Sharon Mensing, April 2015

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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