The Poet

Features

• Cover Type: Mass Market Paperback with 501 pages
• Published by: Vision
• Edition: 1st Edition January 14, 1997
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 0446602612
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-0446602617
• Book Dimensions: 4.7 x 3.9 x 0.8 inches
• Weighs: 4.2 ounces

Product Review
Jack McEvoy is a Denver crime reporter with the stickiest assignment of his career. His twin brother, homicide detective Sean McEvoy, was found dead in his car from a self-inflicted bullet wound to the head--an Edgar Allen Poe quote smeared on the windshield. Jack is going to write the story. The problem is that Jack doesn't believe that his brother killed himself, and the more information he uncovers, the more it looks like Sean's death was the work of a serial killer. Jack's research turns up similar cases in cities across the country, and within days, he's sucked into an intense FBI investigation of an Internet pedophile who may also be a cop killer nicknamed the Poet. It's only a matter of time before the Poet kills again, and as Jack and the FBI team struggle to stay ahead of him, the killer moves in, dangerously close.

In a break from his Harry Bosch novels--including The Concrete Blonde and The Last Coyote--Edgar-winning novelist Michael Connelly creates a new hero who is a lot greener but no less believable. The Poet will keep readers holding their breath until the very end: the characters are multilayered, the plot compelling, and the denouement a true surprise. Connelly fans will not be disappointed. --Mara Friedman

From Publishers Weekly
In a departure from his crime novels featuring LAPD's Harry Bosch, Connelly (The Last Coyote) sets Denver journalist Jack McEvoy on an intricate case where age-old evils come to flower within Internet technology. Jack's twin brother, Sean, a Denver homicide detective obsessed with the mutilation murder of a young woman, is discovered in his car, dead of an apparently self-inflicted gunshot, with a cryptic note written on the windshield. Jack's investigation uncovers a series of cop suicides across the country, all of which have in common both the cops' deep concerns over recent cases and their last messages, which have been taken, he quickly determines, from the writings of Edgar Allan Poe. As his information reopens cases in Chicago, Baltimore, Dallas, New Mexico and Florida, Jack joins up with a team from the FBI's Behavioral Science Section, which includes sharp, attractive agent Rachel Walling. Connections between the dead cops, the cases they were working on and the FBI profile of a pedophile whom readers know as William Gladden occur at breakneck speed, as Jack and the team race to stay ahead of the media. Edgar-winning Connelly keeps a surprise up his sleeve until the very end of this authoritatively orchestrated thriller, when Jack finds himself in California, caught at the center of an intricate web woven from advanced computer technology and more elemental drives.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Reader Reviews
This was my first Connelly book, and safe to say I'm totally hooked. From reading about his other books, this is one of his non-Bosch books, and as such, was a fortunate place to begin. What we have here is an old-fashioned page turner. A bare bones summary would be a Denver reporter loses his twin brother cop to suicide, purportedly over a particularly disturbing, unsolved homicide. As he copes, the reporter learns about a number of police suicides, with several seeming related. At that point in the novel, it becomes a struggle to put the book down. I had to remind myself to slow my reading so I wouldn't miss anything, yet I was tearing through the pages as fast as I could. You won't want to be bothered by anything else for a few hours. The manhunt is breathlessly told, and becomes scarier as you peek into the mind of the perpetrator. Comparisons to "Silence of The Lambs" are understandable, but unfair. Honestly, this book isn't as good as THAT one, but it doesn't miss by much. Lector is nothing like the Poet; they're two different animals. The final quarter of the book is best read at night, or better yet, like 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning, with only a lamp illuminating the page. It's a bit thrilling when the pieces fit together so unexpectedly yet neatly. There's a satisfying click to each piece of the puzzle as it fits into place. Here's my big problem: the paperback edition I read ends with a several-page peek at his recent book, "The Narrows." If I'm not mistaken, characters from this book make it into that one, but somehow dovetails with his other books, of which there hae been seven or eight in between. My problem then is that I have one heck of a lot of reading to do... Comment | | (Report this)