Sara's Review: Waterkill by Mark Donovan
Author Request/Reviewer Purchase
Publisher:
Released: November 17, 2015
Genre: Mystery, Thriller & Suspense
Length: 302 pages
Format: ebook, paperback
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Blurb
With the mysterious outbreak of a deadly disease in a Yemeni village, followed by an increase in terrorist chatter after the crash of a small airplane in eastern Alaska, CEO Dr. Dave Henson and colleague Ron Blackwell of NSurv Inc. are tapped by the Department of Homeland Security to locate the aircraft wreckage and its suspected deadly contents. While Henson and Blackwell are in the eastern mountains of Alaska helping the U.S. Border Patrol locate the missing aircraft and its contents, Dave’s wife, internationally known journalist Dana Cogswell, goes missing while covering another sudden and suspicious epidemic in a small town in Germany. Dave races from Alaska to Germany to rescue Dana and ends up on a quest to the Middle East to find her. Along the way he learns of a shocking betrayal of friendship and that the path to Dana ultimately leads to the terrorist leader behind the deadly outbreaks.
2.5 (Three) Boundless Stars
I was offered a copy in exchange for an honest review; but I decided to just purchase a copy for myself; the premise behind the novel looked promising, and I was extremely intrigued. The body of the story, for the most part, didn’t disappoint, except for the dialogue. This is the first book I’ve ever read where the dialogue actually made the book worse; it is so lackluster and stilted, instead of adding to thrills of the situation, it took away. There were almost no emotions in any of the characters, other than the villains, which I will say, were done exceptionally well; I truly hated them. Unfortunately; I never truly engaged with our hero, or any other characters. There were also so many secondary characters brought in, they were lost in the shuffle, half the time they were killed off with very little fanfare, so it’s like they didn’t matter at all. I also have to ask; was it necessary to have our damsel in distresses tripping and running into everything? I mean seriously!
On the upside, I really like how Donavan made a point to show the difference between a Muslim extremist, and a peaceful Muslim just trying to live their lives. I think we, in the western world, tend to think all Muslims are terrorist when that is not the case, and I am glad Donavan clearly made the distinction. Overall; Waterkill is getting 2.5 Boundless stars; it could have been better but some of it was OK.