Another winner from prolific Patterson

Now You See Her, by James Patterson and Michael Ledwidge (Century, RRP $40):

I don’t know how James Patterson does it but here he goes with yet another book: one of two published on the same day (the other being Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life, a book for his younger fans).

Nina Bloom is a successful lawyer and loving mother who has built a happy life in New York.

She would do anything to protect her life, including lying to everyone about her past – even her daughter.

When an innocent man is framed for murder, she knows that she cannot let him pay for the real killer’s crimes, and so she risks everything to return to Florida and confront the evil she fled almost two decades earlier.

It is then we learn about her past as Jeanine Baker, a young college student who made a mistake and had her life change forever. She had been happy in her first life, 19 years ago, with a handsome husband and happy marriage.

However, a terrible secret made her run for her life and change her identity.

For the most part, I’ve always preferred James Patterson’s solo books over his collaborations but he seems to have great chemistry with Michael Ledwidge and I’ve really enjoyed every one of their co-authored novels.

This is their best effort yet: the plot twists are fantastic and it is great to have a main female character who is both strong and three-dimensional.

Patterson has had more New York Times bestsellers than any other writer, according to Guinness World Records, and while some critics and other authors like to have a poke at him for being so prolific, millions of readers out there would challenge their not-so-flattering assessments of his writing.

I’m one of those readers.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.