Garden Of Beasts
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Amazon.co.uk Review
As is the case with many in the US legal profession, Jeffery Deaver decided to switch one moneymaking job for another--and thank God he did (who needs another lawyer?), when he can produce books like Garden of Beasts. His Lincoln Rhyme crime novels, with their doughty quadriplegic investigator, have been consistently excellent, with only a touch of tiredness creeping in recently. Rhyme was a highly unusual protagonist, and the convoluted serial killer narratives were refreshingly innovative in a desperately overcrowded field. In such winners as The Bone Collectorand The Stone Monkey, Rhyme and Amelia (his police colleague) had their work cut out. But it was apparent that Deaver might be sensing imminent burnout when he came up with two new heroes in The Blue Nowhere: cop Frank Bishop and computer hacker Wyatt Gillette.
And it seems this change of pace didn’t slake Deaver’s desire for the new; here he is changing direction again with Garden of Beasts, a period-set thriller that is as utterly different from anything he’s written as might be imagined--but quite as adroitly written. The setting is New York in the Thirties, and the protagonist here is hitman Paul Schumann, who ends up in police custody after one of his hits misfires. Schumann is given two options: journey to Berlin to terminate Hitler’s associate Reinhard Ernst, or end up in jail for a very long time. Guess which option Schumann chooses? Correct! His danger-fraught journey through a vividly created Berlin, as the preparations for the Olympics transform the city, has the pulse-raising energy of the Rhyme books--particularly as a canny German cop is breathing down Schumann’s neck. With its scarifying picture of a burgeoning Third Reich, Garden of Beasts is Deaver on top form; perhaps Schumann might be more fully developed, but few Deaver fans will complain.--Barry Forshaw --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Amazon.co.uk Review
Jeffrey Deaver's thrillers are united by his fascination with people doing what they are good at. Garden of Beasts is separated in time and place from his modern thrillers, but both of its heroes are supremely competent men. The shame is that they are working against each other. Gun for hire Paul Schumann is offered a chance to avoid the electric chair. All he has to do is go to Berlin for the Olympics and take out Ernst, chief of the bureaucrats who is building German's military might for Hitler. And in Berlin, honest apolitical cop Kohl finds himself on Schumann's trail without any idea of what he is up to. Deaver is as good here at what an intelligent policeman could do with limited forensic resources as he is in his series about contemporary high-tech criminalist Lincoln Rhyme.
Ernst, meanwhile, is caught up in the Third Reich's vicious infighting and hard at work at a particularly nasty and inventive scheme. This is a splendidly atmospheric historical thriller that wears its research lightly--it is also endlessly inventive in the twists and turns of its characters' movements through a society built on betrayal and sudden death. --Roz Kaveney --This text refers to an alternate Audio CD edition.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I enjoyed this read a lot, but I have several reservations. I definitely disagree with one reviewer here who states that this novel is well-researched. German translations are a big issue on this story, and anybody with a smattering of German, or who has spent some time in Germany, will notice them and be irritated by them. I am beginning to wonder if Deaver spent any time here at all. Too many "Ach's" for starters. You hardly ever here it in Germany. Nobody, no matter where they are from or what language they speak would call Alexanderplatz the "Alexander Plaza". And even if they did translate it, it would be Alexander Square, not Plaza. Many English-speaking writers writing about German language or expression make similar awful mistakes. I had a similar issue with Daniel Silva recently. Similarly, translating "Heil" to "Hail" became really irritating after a while, and these errors certainly detracted from my enjoyment of the story. Essentially, the novel appears poorly researched, which is sad, because the story has great potential, and the descriptions are otherwise quite good.
There are two main characters here, Paul Shumann, an American hit-man, who has fallen foul of the law, and is forced by the US government to work for them. It's a bit of an overworked idea in popular fiction lately, but it is nicely handled. Shumann is sent to Berlin to assassinate Reinhard Ernst, an important member of the Third Reich. Then you have Willi Kohl, a criminal police inspector, suffering under the Third Reich regime, where his powers are siginificantly curbed by Heinrich Himmler's security service. It was refreshingly nice to see a "good" German in a World War II story. All of this is set in the background of the Berlin Olympics. Overall, I recommend the book to any prospective reader. The characters have well-described relationships and interactions with each other, and some of the narrative describing wartime Berlin is charming. But there were simply too many translation errors that ended up irritating me along the way.
There are two main characters here, Paul Shumann, an American hit-man, who has fallen foul of the law, and is forced by the US government to work for them. It's a bit of an overworked idea in popular fiction lately, but it is nicely handled. Shumann is sent to Berlin to assassinate Reinhard Ernst, an important member of the Third Reich. Then you have Willi Kohl, a criminal police inspector, suffering under the Third Reich regime, where his powers are siginificantly curbed by Heinrich Himmler's security service. It was refreshingly nice to see a "good" German in a World War II story. All of this is set in the background of the Berlin Olympics. Overall, I recommend the book to any prospective reader. The characters have well-described relationships and interactions with each other, and some of the narrative describing wartime Berlin is charming. But there were simply too many translation errors that ended up irritating me along the way.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
It would appear that in his writings, Deaver works best by sticking to the formula of safe characters, and dictated plot...Sachs and Rhyme would write the book for him, if you know what I mean...so in deviating from this, he leaves himself vulnerable...a little like entering an unfamiliar city with only a scant map for direction...not somewhere you are familiar with, and subsequently you are left wondering what you should do, and where you should go. Am I rambling on? probably, but my point is that Garden of Beasts...a good novel in it's own right I'm sure, is not his best work. You come to expect better from Deaver. I am no expert, so can't really criticize...but I certainly know that did not enjoy this book as much as his Lincoln Rhyme thrillers...seemed poorly written maybe, a little childish...juvenile maybe...but enjoyable none the less
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Having picked up this book on the spare of the moment, not at all familiar with any previous works by Deaver, i did not really know what i was letting myself in for...but how exhilarated i became in this authors work as i trode through the pages of this truly superbly written book. I was completely encapsulated within the perfect pace and plotting, intriguing characters and many climaxing moments that Deaver presented. As with all the great books that i have read and really enjoyed, i struggled to put this book down once i had started and felt totally rewarded when i had finished. I could continue to give many details about particular aspects within this story, which at times were sheer brilliance in writing, but the best advice i could give anybody who is considering this book is just; "read it and find out what it is all about for yourself and YOU WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED!!" I for one, will be definitely seeking other works by Deaver because if the quality of this book is anything to go by, then some great nights of reading are to come!
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Story set in the past.
Good book, easy read but strange to be set in the past and in Germany. Quite a good cat and mouse chase and the ending was a bit of a suprise. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Ms. J. A. Evans
Gold medal winning fiction
Set in the backdrop of the Berlin Olympics this is a tense thriller featuring an american hit man and a dogged policeman who is on his tail for a crime he didn't commit and with no... Read more
Published 3 months ago by RoverP
1st time using a flipback book.
Not having seen a flipback edition of a book it took a bit of getting used to but was enjoyabole & could be very useful if travelling on a bus or train with not a lot of room for... Read more
Published 7 months ago by Mrs. H. Newell
Unexpectedly Brilliant
I'd already read and been transfixed by 'Broken Window' but when I looked at the first page of this book to see it was about a 1930's American assasin I very nearly put it right... Read more
Published 20 months ago by Wild about Wilder
Big change..period piece from Deaver..OK
I had avoided this for a long time as I couldn't connect the classic Deaver with a period novel set during the start of Nazi Germany. Read more
Published 22 months ago by Clive
Good, Tense Thriller
This is the first Jeffery Deaver novel that I have read that is not set in the 'present day', and I was curious as how it would stand up in comparison to his other novels. Read more
Published on 12 Mar 2009 by J.Flood
Ach! Don't menshun se var!
Oh dear! Nice idea; distinctly average execution. The obvious faults with this effort have been mentioned elsewhere so I won't labour these. Read more
Published on 8 April 2008 by still searching
Garden of Beasts (Audio CD)
the difficulty with Audio books ts that if they are shortened and not the full book much of the character and atmosphere needed to make it a good story is lost. Read more
Published on 19 Oct 2007 by Mr. D. Wilson
A Brilliant King of the Thrillers
I havd never read any Deaver until Garden of beasts, What an excellent Thriller with a nice slow build up of characters and situations which made me not wish to hurry up and read... Read more
Published on 10 May 2007 by Benacre Broad
exellent
I was a bit dubious about reading a period thriller but I got into it straight away and then I couldn't put it down. Read more
Published on 4 Sep 2006 by H Patel
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