Official Review: Cross Your Heart by Lorine S Thomas
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Khushi
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Official Review: Cross Your Heart by Lorine S Thomas
[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Cross Your Heart" by Lorine S Thomas.]
1 out of 4 stars
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Cross Your Heart is the debut novel of Lorine S Thomas, and is a work of fiction belonging to the suspense/thriller genre. The book fails to deliver at many levels- be it the general flow of the story or the complexity of plot; which did not make it a very enjoyable read.
At the onset there are far too many grammatical mistakes in the book. This is more prominent in the first three chapters, and does reduce as you move ahead. Nonetheless such mistakes are irksome, and negatively affect the pace of reading, drawing your attention away from the story itself. The proofreading therefore, is inadequate, and the syntactical errors consistently break the flow of the story.
Moving beyond the obvious, there are many shortcomings in the writing, especially viz-a-viz the basic storyline and the manner of writing. The plot itself is simple enough. Gruesome murders are being committed in the city in quick succession and the story moves forward as the killer targets new victims and the police try to solve the crimes. As it is revealed that the victims have been students at the same university in the same year, it becomes evident that the work is that of a serial killer. So far so good. However, it is painfully clear that the novel lacks the central element of a thriller –suspense.
The problem starts at the very beginning, as the prologue itself gives away certain key mysteries, which should have been unraveled much later, and that too gradually. The author rushes through while disclosing the vital elements of the story and the novel falls short of building up to the climax, making it a dull and uninteresting read. In any case, most of the times you have already guessed what the revelations are going to be and are not taken by surprise. Flimsy and hurried explanations are given while revealing the sub-plots of the story, giving the impression that they have been added as an after-thought.
A better sequential rearranging of the chapters could have helped here, but in the absence of the same, the novel does not hold your attention and has a spluttering flow. There is no shocking truth to unearth, and the story drags along predictable lines with random ideas and moments tumbling one after the other.
Another issue is the writing style itself, which is halting and abrupt. The dialogues are often unoriginal. Sometimes the characters speak too much, and in clichéd phrases and expressions, when what is required is a stunned silence, in which a vivid account of the scene would be much more effective. At other times, a lot of description is given of random things not relevant to the story or not essential for building an image of the scene in the reader’s head. For instance, the author begins to describe an office that a character is entering is detail, then ends abruptly and begins talking about something else altogether. Even such a description, which is anyways irrelevant, is marked by grammatical errors-a double jeopardy that distances you further from the plot.
To sum up, I found this book an uninteresting and tedious read, marred by an unoriginal plot, and a clichéd and defective style of writing, and for that I am giving this book 1 out of 4 stars. I am not giving it 2 stars, as in my opinion, it does not meet any of the checkboxes of a good suspense-thriller -mystery, chilling climax, and an original, gripping and unpredictable plot. When you add to it the glaring grammatical errors, and the halting and unclear style of writing, it does not seem to be a worthwhile read at all.
******
Cross Your Heart
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1 out of 4 stars
Share This Review
Cross Your Heart is the debut novel of Lorine S Thomas, and is a work of fiction belonging to the suspense/thriller genre. The book fails to deliver at many levels- be it the general flow of the story or the complexity of plot; which did not make it a very enjoyable read.
At the onset there are far too many grammatical mistakes in the book. This is more prominent in the first three chapters, and does reduce as you move ahead. Nonetheless such mistakes are irksome, and negatively affect the pace of reading, drawing your attention away from the story itself. The proofreading therefore, is inadequate, and the syntactical errors consistently break the flow of the story.
Moving beyond the obvious, there are many shortcomings in the writing, especially viz-a-viz the basic storyline and the manner of writing. The plot itself is simple enough. Gruesome murders are being committed in the city in quick succession and the story moves forward as the killer targets new victims and the police try to solve the crimes. As it is revealed that the victims have been students at the same university in the same year, it becomes evident that the work is that of a serial killer. So far so good. However, it is painfully clear that the novel lacks the central element of a thriller –suspense.
The problem starts at the very beginning, as the prologue itself gives away certain key mysteries, which should have been unraveled much later, and that too gradually. The author rushes through while disclosing the vital elements of the story and the novel falls short of building up to the climax, making it a dull and uninteresting read. In any case, most of the times you have already guessed what the revelations are going to be and are not taken by surprise. Flimsy and hurried explanations are given while revealing the sub-plots of the story, giving the impression that they have been added as an after-thought.
A better sequential rearranging of the chapters could have helped here, but in the absence of the same, the novel does not hold your attention and has a spluttering flow. There is no shocking truth to unearth, and the story drags along predictable lines with random ideas and moments tumbling one after the other.
Another issue is the writing style itself, which is halting and abrupt. The dialogues are often unoriginal. Sometimes the characters speak too much, and in clichéd phrases and expressions, when what is required is a stunned silence, in which a vivid account of the scene would be much more effective. At other times, a lot of description is given of random things not relevant to the story or not essential for building an image of the scene in the reader’s head. For instance, the author begins to describe an office that a character is entering is detail, then ends abruptly and begins talking about something else altogether. Even such a description, which is anyways irrelevant, is marked by grammatical errors-a double jeopardy that distances you further from the plot.
To sum up, I found this book an uninteresting and tedious read, marred by an unoriginal plot, and a clichéd and defective style of writing, and for that I am giving this book 1 out of 4 stars. I am not giving it 2 stars, as in my opinion, it does not meet any of the checkboxes of a good suspense-thriller -mystery, chilling climax, and an original, gripping and unpredictable plot. When you add to it the glaring grammatical errors, and the halting and unclear style of writing, it does not seem to be a worthwhile read at all.
******
Cross Your Heart
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon | on Barnes and Noble | Hassle-Free Sample
Like Khushi's review? Post a comment saying so!
Latest Review: "Harvest" by Beth Martinu
