OnlineBookClub.org

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "From The Killer's Eyes" by Morgan C. Amos.]

From the Killer’s Eyes by Morgan C. Amos is a crime horror book. The killer is introduced right away and the reader is invited inside his mind. I thought this was a novel concept, which is why I picked out this book to read and review. The story has potential, but the grammatical flaws greatly reduced my enjoyment of this book.

The story follows Bradley, a young serial killer. He is being trailed by a detective who is investigating a recent murder. We meet Katie, a wheel-chair bound college student. Bradley becomes infatuated with Katie. Will Katie become his next victim? Only time will tell.

The book starts off with the back-stories of the main characters: Bradley the killer, Katie, a potential victim, and Detective Callaghan, a police detective working to solve the murders. The character back-stories tell everything in a very matter-of-fact way, which gives the writing a rough-draft feel. The author reveals everything about the characters up front, which takes out some of the mystery and suspense.

There are numerous spelling and grammatical errors throughout the book. The most disconcerting issue is the lack of punctuation for the dialogue. There are no quotations or commas for any of the dialogue. The large amount of dialogue throughout the book makes this a big issue. This brought down my rating significantly.

The author’s descriptions were good. The scenes cut from one another in a timely, logical manner. I was able to visualize the events from the descriptions. The action in the story has a soap opera feel, in a good way.

I think Bradley is a little boring and dumb for a serial killer. I was expecting his background to be a little more traumatic. However, there are some truly disturbing glimpses into his mind. The story is written in third person, so the reader is not always looking through his eyes.

Two of the characters had similar names: Katie and Kelly. This, coupled with the lack of dialogue punctuation, made the storyline difficult to follow at times. The dialogue, although confusing, did help me gain insight into the characters' personalities.

The ending has a detailed build-up, but overall I did not feel much suspense. I was interested in finding out what happened, but I would not consider this book a real page-turner. This is partially due to the grammar issues and dialogue. At some points during the action, I wanted more of a view inside Bradley’s head to see why he was making the choices he did at the end. The ending wraps up the events satisfactorily, but with a little twist that I was not expecting.

I give From the Killer’s Eyes 2 out of 4 stars. The story has potential to be good. Even with the grammar issues, I still wanted to read it and find out how it ended. Unfortunately, the lack of editing and rough draft-feel prevents this tale from achieving its potential.

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From The Killer's Eyes
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Like Lisalovecraft's review? Post a comment saying so!

That's a really unique idea for a story. I hope the author might consider doing a little re-working.

I looked at her bio on Amazon, and she has an interesting and pretty impressive background. She has another book (the Deadly Prayer) coming out this year, I would be interested to see what her second effort will produce.

Thanks for an engaging review!

I'll have to check out her bio! The story idea was great, and the book had many positives. I think Bradley was an effective villain, and I had some moments of being skeeved out by his thought processes! With some editing, it could have been much better. I will have to check out her next book, because I think Morgan Amos has great potential as a writer. Thanks for the feedback on the review, I appreciate it.

Excellent, thorough review. Psycho is similar in some ways; the famous movie is quite true to the book, but the novel also reveals the thoughts and motivations of Norman Bates. From the Killer’s Eyes sounds like an all-too-common instance of a self-published book rushed into print.

That's too bad that the author didn't include a more in depth look into the killers mind. Since the book is titled From the Killer's Eyes, I would have expected a little more.

It had a really intriguing plot that just needed to be filled out with more details to make it complete. There were several passages that read more like an outline to me.

Great review! Sorry the book wasn't a real page turner. The lack of dialogue punctuation would drive me crazy!

april-ballard wrote:It had a really intriguing plot that just needed to be filled out with more details to make it complete. There were several passages that read more like an outline to me.

You read this too? I completely agree with you, it read like an outline at times. With some fleshing out, I think the story has potential.

-- 20 May 2015, 16:06 --

bookowlie wrote:Great review! Sorry the book wasn't a real page turner. The lack of dialogue punctuation would drive me crazy!

It was extremely frustrating!! You don't appreciate punctuation until it's missing!!!