Point Blank - FBI series by Catherine Coulter

Catherine Coulter’s Point Blank, the latest installment to her FBI series, could have been a terrific book with its complex and detailed story line but unfortunately the plot and subplots were all so unrelated and even unbelievable in spots that the quick let’s close-it-up-quick ending left the reader feeling cheated. Then too, as I usually have no problem classifying Coulter with Julie Garwood, Tami Hoag, and Patricia Cornwell I had difficulty in telling this novel from those written by a new writer with a lot of ideas but no way to gel their assorted thoughts into a concise and interesting story line. For example, Point Blank begins with one plot involving Special Agent Ruth Warnecki seeking Confederate gold in a cave where she is overcome by toxic fumes only to have Ms Coulter quickly veer off to another plot where Ruth is found unconscious (and incidentally has amnesia) by the local Sheriff. Of course, a romantic relationship is sure to follow, especially when an attempt is made on Ruth’s life while she is staying at the Sheriff’s house. To top all of this off a gifted violinist, from the Stanislaus School of Music, whose head master is none other than Sheriff Noble’s uncle, is found dead in the cave where Ruth had been spelunkering and it just happens to turn out that this uncle has had an ongoing affair with the murdered girl. Hold on though that isn’t all that Coulter wants us to try and figure out as she has also thrown in the kidnapping and murder of a local entertainer, as well as, a couple of insane serial killers, named Moses Grace and Claudia, who are intent on killing Savich and Sherlock. Sadly, with all the mystery stories to solve and questions to answer, Coulter was unable to give sufficient depth and time to any of them thus sacrificing the possible suspenseful thriller that this book could have been had she not tried to encompass so many plots in one book. Finally, the story ended too quickly, with a very unsatisfying conclusion that never sufficiently dealt with all the questions that were raised during the first two-thirds of the book such as why attractive, young Claudia would be interested in someone as old and sick as Moses Grace.

Overall, Point Blank is definitely not on the par with Coulter’s The Maze, The Edge and The Target as I found the numerous plots annoying and some of the poorly drawn characters without any believable motive for their actions. However, Catherine Coulter is a superb craftswoman and just because this book showed a lack of her usual story telling skill I will still be looking forward to her next book to see if she has returned to her prior high standards.

For more information on Catherine Coulter or any of her books be sure to use your Google search engine.

[tags]book review, book report, Catherine Coulter, Savich, Sherlock, mystery, Point Blank, FBI, Google, suspense[/tags]