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DEAD RUN
by Erica Spindler
Mira Books, June 2002
384 pages
$22.95
ISBN: 1551669145


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Liz Ames has been distraught for the last few months. She has received a call from the Key West Police Department informing her that her sister Rachel Howard, a pastor at the Paradise Christian Church, has disappeared and no one has been able to locate her. The last time she heard from Rachel was a telephone call letting her know about some evil things going on in Key West without being specific. They were both upset that night and have not talked since then. Liz then decides to close her Michigan family counseling practice and open one near her sisterís church in the hope of trying to find out what happened to her. She will get more than she bargained for.

When she arrives, the police do not take her seriously, claiming that her sister might have run away after suffering a nervous breakdown. Liz then goes to the church offering her services as a family counselor while at the same time trying to learn more about Rachel. She is shocked to learn that in the last few months prior to her vanishing, her sister was preaching a fire and brimstone pulpit. Something that is very unlike her and quite disturbing to Liz.

Less than twenty-four hours after Liz begins her investigation, strange things begin to happen. A wealthy banker has apparently committed suicide after jumping from his second floor window; a bank employee has disappeared; and Liz finds the body of her first patients mutilated at the churchís garden.

The police start their investigation but Liz is unsure on whom to trust. She will join forces with Rick Wells, a troubled, former cop to find out the townís hidden little secrets. They encounter fraud, vicious murder, illegal drugs, and a mysterious cult calling themselves The Horned Flower. People in the island are not who they claim to be and Liz is running out of time in trying to find her sister.

One of the main problems with this novel is that it shares a theme with a Nora Roberts novel titled DIVINE EVIL. The two story lines are different but they both share a similar theme -- a tight knit community whose denizens might be involved in a satanic cult. Spindlerís novel carries a few surprises that fail within the book due to minimal development with the secondary characters. The mastermind of all this evil sticks out like a sore thumb. The character blends well in the Key West community but looks suspicious everywhere else. It is like having a big, box office movie star in an unassuming role in a police show. There is no way that they cannot be the guilty party in whatever crime is being portrayed.

The book ends in a trail of blood where all the bad guys get their just desserts and the good guys will always prevail. The soap opera ending of Dead Run should not deter you in trying another Spindler novel. Try Bone Cold. It gives you a deeper sense of satisfaction after having read it.

Reviewed by Angel L. Soto, November 2002

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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