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Book Jacket

The Face Thief:
A Novel
by Eli Gottlieb

Publisher: William Morrow
Publication date: 01/17/2012.
Thrillers, 256 pp.

Number of reader reviews: 31
Readers' Consensus: 3.5
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First Impressions: Page 5 of 5
Rated 2 of 5 of 5 by Lauren C. (Los Angeles, CA)

Unthrilling thriller
A good thriller moves quickly, taking its characters through lots of twists and turns and keeping the reader second guessing. The author gives enough backstory to each character to make them interesting. Unfortunately, this book has none of these elements.

Almost nothing happens in this book, which is about a woman who may or may not have been murdered and who may or may not have done it. The characters were so uninteresting that I didn't really care who did it, and so few characters were in this book that it had absolutely no suspense. Saying that the plot was thin would be an understatement.

The author also had an annoying habit of having each character think through what previously happened to them instead of actually putting the characters in present tense and making them move around and do something, or finding more subtle and varied ways to insert some backstory.

Skip this book.

Rated 2 of 5 of 5 by Susan S. (Lakeville, MA)

Difficult to get into
I had a very difficult time with this book. I couldn't get into it -- in fact, I started it three times. I had difficulty following the plot and I had to force myself to finish it. The reason why I was initially interested in reading The Face Thief was because of the concept of face reading, but I found the whole idea silly and therefore, could not take this book seriously.

Rated 1 of 5 of 5 by Beverly D. (Palm Harbor, FL)

What a disappointment!
Comparing this effort to James M. Cain or Ian McEwan, as the cover suggests, is an affront to both authors. This novel is a lingering shadow of what it MIGHT have been. There is an interesting idea here but what suspense there might have been was hampered by the author's lumbering style. It was slow going and the cutting back and forth between the three characters made for a very convoluted rythym. And once "who" dunnit was revealed, the ending was not at all satisfying. It sort of just ended...life goes on, I guess. I will not read this author again.

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