Kiss the Girls by James Patterson

"He knew that I was here in Durham. He knew who I was."

Alex Cross's niece, Naomi, has gone missing from North Carolina. She hasn't been heard from in four days. His family makes it his responsibility to find her, and since he helped raise her in childhood, he is more than willing to join the search. But his quest to find his missing niece introduces him to a serial killer that hunts in the area, and the fear that Naomi may be another victim.

My first impression of this book was that it has a lot of graphic violence, mostly against women, including rape, beatings, and murder. If you are sensitive to any of these things, this is definitely not the book for you. 

The further I read, the more disenchanted I became with the book... I mean, it's James Patterson, right? Extremely popular murder-mystery writer. And Kiss the Girls is one of his most hyped-up novels. So statistics implied I was going to really enjoy this book. But honestly, I like a lot of suspense in my murder-mysteries and I felt like JP relied mostly on the brutality of the story, and the mystery of who-done-it, to keep the reader reading. Which is fine, I guess, if all you want from your mysteries is an ID on a brutal killer... I just wanted more.

Shortly after arriving in North Carolina, the FBI 'hires' Cross to join the search for the serial killer in a more official capacity. Having already decided that his niece may have been a victim of said serial killer he joins the investigation and discovers there's not one, but two murderers with similar victim preferences and similar predilections who may or may not be competing with each other. But who are they and which one took Naomi? 

I did think the idea of two serial killers, each aware of the other, operating on separate sides of the country was an interesting idea. And because Alex Cross is the hero of the story, it's no spoiler to say, you know he's going to make it his mission to catch both of them.

Enter Kate McTiernan, a victim of Casanova (what the North Carolina killer calls himself) who escapes from his 'house' making her the only living witness to where Naomi might be and what is happening to her if she's there. Cross quickly develops a relationship with Kate (not sexual), that I found to be both pivotal to the plot and largely unrealistic. Even though they're just friends I found it unlikely that she'd so easily become so close to a man after being brutalized by one, but I admit I'm not exactly an expert on rape. I assume after her experience she would probably suffer from some form of PTSD but she seems mostly fine except injured and angry. And Alex, who's been trained both as a cop and as a psychologist should know better than to get overly involved with a victim of a crime that he is investigating.

Eventually the book included some suspense, but not until it got close to the end, when you could practically hear the handcuffs being clicked around the murderers' wrists, which for me was too little too late.

I also had trouble getting into the writing style. It seemed a little flat in some places. Sometimes Patterson would inject what seemed like a poor word choice or phrase into a sentence that left me wondering if that's how people in the South actually talk...I'm from the North so I wouldn't know. Overall, I found this to be mystery that despite its gruesome crimes, seemed a little lackluster.

This is my second James Patterson novel and I won't be reading a third.