Short & Sweet Review: 14th Deadly Sin by James Patterson

Title: 14th Deadly Sin

Author: James Patterson

Series: Women’s Murder Club, #14

Published: May 2015, Little, Brown & Company

Format: Hardcover, 349 pages

Source: Personal copy

Summary: 

Detective Lindsay Boxer and her three best friends are back and recovering from the events that pushed them all to the edge.

After her near-death experience, Yuki is seeing her life from a new perspective and is considering a change in her law career. San Francisco Chronicle reporter Cindy has healed from her gunshot wound and has published a book on the infamous serial killers she helped to bring down. Lindsay is just happy that the gang are all still in one piece.

But a new terror is sweeping the streets of San Francisco. A gang dressed as cops are ransacking the city, and leaving a string of dead bodies in their wake. Lindsay is on the case to track them down and needs to discover whether these killers could actually be police officers. Maybe even cops she already knows…

***Short & Sweet Reviews are
short, quick reviews. These will mainly be used for series books where I
have already done full reviews on some of the earlier books or for
books that I feel will suffice with a quick review. These will not be
used for review requests or blog tours.

My thoughts:  Another good installment in the Women’s Murder Club series. This one picks up a bit after the previous one ends and while it has a lot going on, it is a bit tamer than some of the other books until the ending…that ending is quite the cliffhanger!

I liked that Joe, Lindsay’s husband, had an active role in this book – Lindsay charged him with looking into the murders that kept happening on Claire’s birthday…were they somehow connected? Meanwhile, Lindsay is busy with figuring out who is responsible for the robberies that keep happening – are they really dealing with corrupt cops? And Yuki has switched jobs and puts her in opposition to her husband. But unfortunately, Cindy and Claire had very minor roles this time around…so much for the “Women’s Murder Club!”

As for the cliff-hanger…while it definitely spiked my curiosity and has me quite eager to read the next book…I do not think it was necessary. I’m not a fan and while I am reading these books way after their publication date, had I been reading them as they were published I would have been pissed – having to wait a whole year is just not cool! Your devoted fans are going to pick up the book, so don’t do that to them.

Books in this series:

    1.   1st to Die                                    13.   Unlucky 13

     2.   2nd Chance                               14.   14th Deadly Sin

     3.   3rd Degree                                15.    15th Affair

     4.   4th of July                                 15.5   The Trial

     5.   The 5th Horseman                   16.    16th Seduction

     6.   The 6th Target                          16.5   The Medical Examiner

     7.   7th Heaven                                 17.    The 17th Suspect   

     8.   The 8th Confession                  18.   The 18th Abduction – due out April 2019

     9.   The 9th Judgment

    10.  10th Anniversary

    11.   11th Hour

    12.   12th of Never