Customer Reviews

The Collectors

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

If you liked David Baldacci's The Camel Club, don't miss The Collectors! The wackiest group of Minutemen in history is back with an unexpected ally, Annabelle Conroy, who brings her extraordinary skill in running million-dollar frauds to the Camel Club's traitor fighting. It's a brilliant development for a series concept that is already one of the most successful variations on the thriller genre in many years.

As before, the Republic is in danger by sinister people who are selling off secrets to the highest bidders to feather their own nests. The evidence of this danger is found in frequent deaths of spies and prominent people. In this case, a rogue assassin has gone into business for himself. In addition to earning a fortune, he is also thrilled to keep souvenirs of those he dispatches.

One of these deaths, that of Jonathan DeHaven, is a quite mysterious one at the Library of Congress that seems on the surface to be from natural causes. But the Camel Club wants to know more and develops an intriguing theory. As a result of the death, Caleb Shaw becomes the literary collection's executor of his former boss's estate. In the process of reviewing the books, Caleb stumbles onto an unexpected volume that raises astonishing questions that are not easily answered. One mystery leads to another when a visit to Jonathan DeHaven's home turns up a telescope trained at an unexpected scene. There's also a photograph of DeHaven with a most attractive young woman. Who could she be?

Separately, we meet the brilliant and energetic con-woman, Annabelle Conroy, who wants millions from . . . and revenge against a casino operator, Jerry Bagger, who once murdered her mother. The book develops that story line until the two stories begin to intertwine. The result is dynamite for adding spice, danger and adventure to the book.

By the end of the book, you'll be excited about the many possibilities that this book opens up for what should be an excellent and ever-improving series.

Mr. Baldacci does an excellent job of developing characters, tossing out intriguing plot developments, mixing in lots of action, and challenging your assumptions about what an intelligent thriller can be like.

It's refreshing, fun and rewarding for those who like original stories with a heart and a strong plot.

Well done, Mr. Baldacci!

It was a pleasant surprise to pick up this book and discover some of the characters from the Camel Club. It's a fast paced story with a lot of sub-plots without getting too complicated. David Baldacci has written some books that weren't great, but on a whole I still consider him one of the best authors in this genre and the Collectors more than lived up to my expectations. You don't have to necessarily have read the Camel Club before this, but I'd recommend it as it's an excellent introduction to the characters that appear in this book. I won't spoil the ending, but I will say that the way this book finishes promises a lot for his next offering, if he chooses to live up to it!

The Collectors is one of Baldacci's more solid efforts, doing what he does best, which is weaving together two seemingly disparate plot lines into a great cohesive thriller.

It's a Camel Club book, which means you have great characters (although we could do with more background on them - Baldacci is generally weak in this area), but he started the series during is annoying character name phase.

Unlike books in his series, this one has a genuine cliffhanger which moves into the next instalment, Stone Cold - I would recommend buying them together so you can roll straight into it. The preceding book does not need reading to get into this one (as good as it is) because Baldacci is also very good at balancing reiterating enough information so as not to annoy a fan of the series, but also allowing a newcomer to read the book standalone.

It's certainly one of my favourite instalments in his collection. Well worth a read.

Thankfully one top of the pile writer who refraines from using gutter words. No swear words and very limited blasphemny. A real pleasure to read such a book that has stong flowing intertwined plots, that are linked to other writings of Baldacci but are able to stand alone in this book. Praise for David's sensitivity to those readers who find it very offputting and offensive to have swear words and blasphemny. The English language doesn't need any reliance on gutter words to produce a good story as Baldacci shows in his writings.

This has been the first David Baldacci book that I have tried and I suspect it will be the last.

The book has weak characters and an unconvincing plot.

To its credit, however, the book did have me in stitches when the criminal mastermind was finally unmasked.

The main quality of the book is that it starts with two lines that it joins later into one without completely closing any one of the two. The two lines are so different that the book becomes kind of funny when they join. On one hand a band of four gangsters that are making millions on the gullible back of a casino boss - who is of course crooked and criminal - in Atlantic City. They succeed though one mistake will cost his life to the younger gangsters who did make the mistake because of his unquenchable hormones. The second line is a spy ring in Washington DC that involves the Library of Congress - LOC for favored fans - and the rare books reading room as the medium for the the circulating of the stolen data and then later as the target itself because of the resistance of some of its personnel. I can't give away all the details of the successful destruction of the spy ring, a destruction that is only reached because the leader of the ring who is an inner circle CIA spy makes several mistakes that are absolutely unexplainable. He does not kill the one person he has abducted for interrogation though he has no use of him any more afterwards and this abducted person is revealed as in the know of too many elements and hence as dangerous. Then we could accumulate the smaller mistakes from beginning to end and the list would be long. Let's mention the last one only that will cost te spy ring boss his life when he decides to have a conversation with the same person as before instead of killing him straight away. How dumb one spy can be! Or is he in love with his counterpart? But the novel suffers because of it. It looks and sounds amateurish when we expect everything to be great art and powerful conjuring magic. The book though has a meaning. It shows marvellously well that no security system is good enough to prevent crime, spying, etc. There is always a possible con or plot, a possible way to make a con or a plot successful. It seems easier to kill someone than to pass water in the morning. The result is that the security of the USA is always endangered because there is a lot of money on the intelligence market and small secrets, or big war plans, will always interest those who have millions they don't know what to do with, especially millions of dollars that are depreciating so fast on the international market, though not on the US market. And in the end the best protection for the country comes from simple law-abiding citizens in alliance with patriotic ex-security people and expert criminals who are patriotic for reasons that have nothing to do with the nation itself, but rather with the USA as the money making territory that they are for them and may not be any more after a successful terrorist attack or war. The security of the US is in other words a simple business in contingency. To believe otherwise is plain either vanity or short-sightedness.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris I Panthéon Sorbonne, University Paris Dauphine, Université Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines.

David Baldacci is the prize winning and best selling author of several novels including: Absolute Power, The Simple Truth and recently The Camel Club. He lives in his native state of Virginia. His writing style makes the story flow and leaves the reader wanting more.

Annabelle is a beautiful con artist and she is planning the most outrageous heist of this century or any other. Jonathan Dellaven is a shy unassuming man, the head of the Rare Books Division at the library of Congress. Jonathan is planning to have a peaceful day among his cherished collection of books, but little does he know it is never going to happen. Something or somebody is lying in wait for him . . .

When fellow librarian Caleb Shaw stumbles across the body of his unfortunate colleague, his friends in the Camel Club are determined to get to the bottom of what after all is an inexplicable death. But when they pay a visit to Jonathan's home it becomes patently obvious that there was much, much more to the mild mannered man than his love of books.

In the meantime Annabelle flees from the terrible repercussions of her plan. The Camel Club members move ever nearer to uncovering a secret code and find themselves confronting powerful enemies who are day by day growing ever more fearful that the truth will come to light. Only someone from Jonathan's mysterious past can save them . . .

I really enjoyed this one. Having read all the previous books by this author, it rates high as far as I'm concerned. It was just that bit different. I can't wait for the next title.

If you have read and liked the Camel Club you should enjoy this. It has the same group of Washington misfits, this time thrown together in a mystery about rare antique American books, political corruption and the world of the professional con.

It starts off with the murder of the new speaker of the House of Congress while he is at a celebration event to mark his appointment. Very soon this is followed by the death of Caleb Shaw's immediate superior at the Liabrary of Congress' Rare Books Dept. It soon becomes apparent that this was no accident and is somehow linked to the first murder. Oliver Stone is quickly on the case and the group become deeply involved in dangerous investigations to solve the murders.

While these events are taking place in Washington, a parallel tale is taking place. We are introduced to a new set of characters, con artists, on a mission in Atlantic City. Their leader Annabel Conroy, is trying to bring down a shady casino owner to the tune of 40 million dollars. It eventually transpires that there is a link between our feisty con lady and one of the Washington murder victims.

As the investigation hots up, another murder occurs and one of the Camel Clubbers is accused. Annabel, having completed her con, should be out of the country but instead goes to Washington and helps to solve the murders. She lends her skills to the group and very soon even Milton, the timid one, is conning too!

This book has a lot going on as both tales run side by side for most of the book. Eventually it becomes clear where the link is and the ends start to tie.

I recommend this to all, as it is a well constructed tale, with a very good plot(s) and some nice twists. It isn't hard to follow despite the fact you jump back and forth between different plot lines to begin with. We learn a little more about our group members this time and I look forward to more Camel Club mysteries!

David Baldacci's The Collector is an eminently put-downable book that fails to develop characters, build tension, or contain credible surprises. This is not a book for readers with an eye for detail or who are pedants for accuracy. At various times while reading this book the same two questions kept recurring to me. Firstly is this book the result of a bet about how many cliches you can pack into some 400 pages ? Secondly, does Baldacci write the storylines for the scooby-doo cartoons ? All that this book requires was for one of the bad guys to say "I would have gotten away with it had it not been for you pesky old folk" for my suspicions to be confirmed.

As a holiday read, or something light and fluffy to pass a commute then I suppose it works. But don't expect a top-notch thriller or any elegant writing. Baldacci must have written much better than this to have built his reputation.