Starred review from August 1, 2005
Although he has done everything from Broadway to film and television, Rubinstein was apparently born to play Dr. Alex Delaware—Kellerman's famously successful clinical psychologist whose cases get darker and more complicated over the years. This is Rubinstein's 19th audio outing as Delaware, and he pulls it off brilliantly: his voice changes definitively but never goes over the top as he moves between the cool, smooth psychologist and his edgier co-investigator, L.A. police lieutenant Milo Sturgis. Rubinstein also brings to instant life dozens of other male and female characters, from love interests to at-risk teenagers and sex criminals—giving each a distinctive personality. An earlier case resurfaces when the teenage boy who abducted and killed a two-year-old girl is released after eight years in detention and calls Delaware to set up a meeting. The boy never appears; his murdered body is later found, and Delaware and Sturgis are quickly involved in a very nasty investigation that takes them into a bleak landscape where children are the victims. There are long stretches of speculative dialogue between Alex and Milo that annoyed some critics of the book, but Rubinstein cleverly turns these into verbal tennis matches that make for fascinating listening. Simultaneous release with the Ballantine hardcover (Reviews, Apr. 25).
April 25, 2005
Psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware stars again after playing second fiddle to Hollywood homicide detective Petra Connor in last year's Twisted
. It's been eight years since Alex provided a psychiatric evaluation of two teenagers, Troy Turner and Rand Duchay, who confessed to abducting and killing a two-year-old girl. Troy is now dead, murdered in prison, and Rand has been released—and he promptly calls Alex to tell him he has some important information. Alex agrees to a meeting, but Rand's not where he said he'd be; shortly thereafter he's found dead. Kellerman always fashions fiendishly complicated cases, both literally and psychologically, for Alex to unravel, and this one is no different. During the course of the investigation, he and longtime pal L.A. police lieutenant Milo Sturgis encounter a host of wayward children, a foster family from hell, infidelities that have to be charted to be kept straight and a serial killer who's the exact opposite of the genre's usual madman slasher but just as deadly. The action occurs mostly in the calculating brains of the two detectives as they turn and sift evidence piece by piece, working every angle until they finally come up with a coherent picture. It's an impressive piece of detection, and readers who enjoy watching the delicate untangling of a Gordian knot–like plot will find this one a winner.