Rocketgirl's Full Review: Sandra Brown - Chill Factor
Sandra Brown started out as a romance writer, but has gradually leaned toward romantic suspense, then finally suspense novels in which a relationship might develop as a result of shared experiences. The latter is the type that she has written in "Chill Factor." I liked her romance novels well enough because they weren't so corny or contrived as other writers. And one of her first suspense novels, French Silk, was very good. Others have been as well. So I had high expectations from this one. Unfortunately, my expectations were too high.
In Chill Factor, Lily Martin has recently been divorced from her abusive husband, Dutch, the chief of police of a small southern town. Their last marital act is to dispose of their cabin property on a remote hillside near the town. The paperwork taken care of, Dutch starts back to town leaving Lily to clean up. She falls asleep and in the meantime, a wicked ice storm makes her drive down the hill treacherous. She attempts the trip and skids out of control when a hiker suddenly steps out on the road. The car is undriveable and the only thing to do in the storm is to walk back up to the cabin.
Lily finds that she has met this man before on a rafting trip, in which both were gathering material for their respective magazines. But her apprehension grows when subtle clues seem to point to Ben Tierney being the same man as one who has killed several local women. Now she is trapped in a cabin in a blizzard with a possible serial killer, with no cell phone service, no vehicle, and no hope of rescue until the storm stops.
That's the main plot. But there are several others going on, that completely divert from the "whodunit" that should be the focus of this story. Though that's a negative from the perspective of plotting, its a positive that the subplots have enough merit and enough interest to keep me reading. Because finding out the killer began to be secondary for me; I wanted to see what happened to some of the other characters.
For example, Dutch's best friend is Wes, the president of the city council. The man is a complete jerk, the coach of the high school football team. The man puts unfair pressure on his son to excel, to live out his unfillled fantasies. He even injects his son with steroids. The man is such a jerk, that I kept hoping that somehow Scott (his son) somehow sticks it to his father. What relevance is it? Not much in that they're both covering a secret that makes them think that the police will think they're suspects in the murders. Other than that this subplot could be completely removed with no detriment to the main story.
And that is the whole trouble. All the small town drama going on feels like it is just there to fill pages instead of fill a story. From that perspective, I think this is one of Sandra Brown's weaker efforts.
She still does a fairly good job building characters, a good example being Wes the coach. You want to hate him, which is the point. Lily is well characterized as an intelligent businesswoman. And most of these small town people are not characterized in a stereotypical way.
I also have to admit that I did not guess the ending of the story. So there were enough red herrings to deflect the reader from guessing what was really going on with the missing women. The ending is probably what saves this book from being very mediocre.
Sandra Brown does have an easy flowing writing style with snappy dialogue and just the right amount of narrative. The chapters are fairly short and there several scene changes in each one. This makes for a fairly fast read. There is one sex scene that, though not offensive, was so completely out of place in the plot, that I didn't bother to do more than skim it because it was a waste of my time.
You may like this novel if its the first one by Sandra Brown you have ever read. But being a long time fan, I was disappointed by its lack of focus and plot.
Suspense abounds in this gripping new thriller from New York Times bestselling author Sandra Brown, in which a successful magazine editor is trapped i...More at Bostic Media
Suspense abounds in this gripping new thriller from New York Times bestselling author Sandra Brown, in which a successful magazine editor is trapped i...More at HotBookSale
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