Book Review: Silent City

I’ve been known to devour my fair share of mystery/thriller books as a reader. I love being caught up in a whirlwind of bad-ass characters, clues laid out like breadcrumbs, and awesome actions scenes. It thrills me when I think I know what’s going to happen next, and then a twist throws me completely off kilter. All of these things are what make a book in this genre so enjoyable to read. Sadly, Silent City failed to deliver on the majority of them.

The opening scene of Silent City held so much promise. It had me in its clutches, and then things slowed nearly to a halt. I was treated to pages upon pages about Pete’s past, his work, and the few friends he had left. Pete Fernandez is not an easy character to like. While I understood that his life was falling apart around him, I never felt the least bit of sympathy for him. See, Pete is an alcoholic. It is never specifically mentioned, but he spends the good majority of the book in a bar or sleeping it off at home. I’ll admit that he did have rather great taste in music. In fact, that’s the one thing Pete and I agreed on.

I just kept hoping for the pace to pick up, for that manic feeling of need to set in. You know the one. Where you can’t stop flipping the pages? Sadly, it never happened. I had no clues to grasp on to, and only Pete’s mediocre attempts at sleuthing to lead me along. Even when things finally clicked into place, and I finally saw where the story was going, it felt slow. Pete’s story never fully invested me.

I missed the excitement. I missed honestly caring about the characters who were on the pages. You have no idea how much it hurt me when (and yes, mild spoiler) one of them died and I didn’t even bat an eyelash. Still, the plot line was at least solid enough to keep me reading to the end. The twist at the end wasn’t too shabby either. Thus the two star rating. Like I mentioned before, so much potential but the delivery wasn’t for me.