Great Characters and Grisly Crimes
I enjoyed The Killing Hour although not as much as The Survivor's Club which I gave a Five Star review. I thought the tension was good although I would have liked the narrative to stay with Kimberly and Mac for longer in places rather than continually returning to Tina and others for such long periods. Perhaps I would have liked the sections focussed on Rainie and Pierce Quincy more if I had read the previous books where they featured, although the emotional moments between them were very sweet even though I didn't know their entire background.

The strong point was definitely the clever plotting and the grisly ideas that Gardner had about how the killer committed the crimes. The characters were also very deep and had interesting backgrounds but somehow this novel failed to grip me. The first couple of chapters dragged a little although I suppose they were necessary to set up the rest of the book. I liked the instant chemistry between the main characters, New Agent Kimberly Quincy and Special Agent Mac McCormack but I thought some of the events at the beginning were very coincidental.

Overall I liked this book and was very pleased with the ending and the romance between Kimberly and Mac. I just felt that there was a little something missing which I could not define that made me skim some of the text to get to the important parts, therefore I did not always find it as compelling and gripping a thriller as I'd hoped. Highlights of the book were definitely Mac and Kimberly's dialogue and relationship and the scary and grisly nature of the crimes. Kimberly was a great female character - strong and driven to succeed with vulnerability hidden just under the surface.

JoAnne

THE KILLING HOUR may remind you, very vaguely, of THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, but that is only because both books feature an overachieving female FBI recruit as the primary character. What is more significant for fans of Lisa Gardner, however, is that THE KILLING HOUR is a sequel of sorts to THE NEXT ACCIDENT. Kimberly Quincy, who survived the events of that fine book, is now at the FBI Academy and is causing a bit of a stir --- for all the wrong reasons. While she technically shows all of the makings of a fine agent, her people skills leave much to be desired. When Kimberly stumbles upon the body of a murder victim, literally at the back doorstep of the FBI's Quantico, Virginia headquarters, it has repercussions, not only for her but also for her father, Pierce Quincy, and his business partner and lover Rainie Conner. Pierce Quincy, a former FBI profiler, and Conner are brought into the case as consultants.

It is soon established, however, that the murder has similarities to a series of killings that took place several years before in Georgia. The Georgia murders involved a fiend who would kidnap pairs of young women and leave the body of one in a place where it would be discovered quickly, while leaving the other alive, but in a place of great peril. The murderer would leave clues to the location of the second victim with the first. There were eight victims...and then the kidnappings and the murders stopped. It now appears, however, that the murderer has changed location and begun again, only this time he has upped the ante.

Special Agent Michael McCormack, who tried unsuccessfully to solve the first series of murders, is drawn back into the investigation --- and incidentally, to Kimberly --- by a mysterious contact who seems to know what the killer will do, and when. The trail ultimately leads to a desperate and cataclysmic confrontation in Virginia's Dismal Swamp --- where nature can be more dangerous than any human killer.

Gardner sets up some interesting internal tension right out of the gate, giving the reader a protagonist that the reader can't quite like but sympathizes with nonetheless. Gardner doesn't pile the suspense on all at once, but adds to it gradually --- a murder here, a mystery there, a personal conflict or two --- until by the end of the book the reader feels like a bunch of raw nerves racing for the comfort of the finish line.

Gardner is a fine writer who gets better with every novel, and by changing the focus of each book among a cast of occasionally recurring characters --- Rainie Conner in THE THIRD VICTIM, Pierce Quincy in THE NEXT ACCIDENT, and now Kimberly Quincy in THE KILLING HOUR --- she lends an air of familiarity to each new novel while keeping her stories original and fresh. She will undoubtedly continue to be an author whose future novels will be eagerly anticipated.

--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

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