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Title/Author

The Stone Monkey

Jeffery Deaver

Average Review Rating Average Rating 8/10 (1 Review)
Book Details

Publisher : Hodder and Stoughton

Published : 2002

Copyright : Jeffery Deaver 2002

ISBN-10 : HB 0-340-73399-3
ISBN-13 : HB 978-0-340-73399-8

Publisher's Write-Up

Lincoln Rhyme returns - to take on the terrifying world of Chinese organized crime.

Recruited to help the US government perform the nearly impossible, Lincoln Rhyme and his partner Amelia Sachs manage to track down a cargo ship carrying two dozen illegal Chinese immigrants, as well as the notorious human smuggler and killer known as the Ghost.

But when the Ghost's capture goes disastrously wrong, Lincoln and Amelia find themselves in a race against time - to stop the Ghost before he can discover and murder the two surviving families who have vanished deep into the labyrinthine world of New York City's Chinese community.

Over the next harrowing forty-eight hours, the Ghost ruthlessly hunts for the families, while Rhyme, aided by a policeman from mainland China, struggles to find them before they die and Sachs pursues a very different kind of police work, forming a connection with one of the immigrants that may have consequences going to the core of her relationship with her partner and lover, Lincoln Rhyme.

With The Stone Monkey, Jeffery Deaver brings back his best-loved characters and displays his enormous talent at a new level. With heart-stopping deadlines, wholly unexpected plot twists, breakneck pacing and people who are extremely real, this novel reminds us once again why The Times hailed Deaver as 'the best psychological thriller writer around'.

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Reader Reviews

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Review by Chrissi (010702) Rating (8/10)

Review by Chrissi
Rating 8/10
Lincoln Rhyme is consulted about the method of entry into the United States of "the Ghost", a Chinese Mafia boss or snakehead. The ghost is a trafficker of human beings, and has been remarkably successful at remaining anonymous, he is, quite literally, a ghost. Lincoln and Amelia, with their team, are asked to do more, much more than just advise, because when the Ghost is threatened with capture, he commits a horrific act, killing the people that he was contracted to bring to America to try to ensure his own safety. Fortunately, though, some survive and try to hide themselves away in the depths of the Chinese Community in New York. Their survival, though, runs contrary to the plans of the Ghost, and he sets about arranging their deaths.

Lincoln is still considering the surgery that may give him back a little movement. Amelia is still very unsure about this, feeling that the risk that he may die under the anaesthetic is just too great. Amelia continues to "walk the grid", acting as the eyes and main sense for Lincoln, but she finds this particular investigation very difficult. She is feeling rather a lack of objectivity about it all at the moment, and is distracted by her wish to start a family, a wish that she is unsure that she and Rhyme may be able to fulfil.

There are some very clever points made in this book, one which has stuck in my mind is when a man bemoans the lack of respect shown to him by his son as he speaks to his own father. He is told by his father that all the boy's life, he has seen his father showing a total lack of respect to the state, a body which people are taught to revere, so why should the son be able to distinguish what to have respect for, if he sees his father as the disrespectful dissident? I thought this was really clever, and could see how it could apply to all modern societies, not just the changing Chinese state.

I have to say that the pace of this book is great, and the characters, in particularly Sammy, are wonderful. One of the things that I felt was that the cadence of the language changed, according to whoever and wherever the scene was set. The Chinese ladies and gentlemen seem more serene than their American counterparts, and even the nature of the ghost himself is not given away by the crimes that he has committed. Any cultural stereotypes aside, this is an excellent thriller, a must read for any Deaver fan.

(Speaking of Mr. Deaver, I was in our local Waterstones the other day, and I picked up a signed copy of The Devil's Teardrop. I was gutted, he had been here, signing books, and we had not known. The lady said that he was very pleasant. I wanted to be rather unpleasant, but the thought of a grown woman throwing a complete wobbly in the middle of the shop was rather sobering, so I'll whinge at you here instead…)
Chrissi (1st July 2002)

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