What do readers think of Kill Alex Cross by James Patterson? Write your own review.

Kill Alex Cross is the 18th in James Patterson’s Alex Cross series. The action starts immediately with the kidnapping from the Branaff School of Zoe and Ethan Coyle, the children of President Edward Coyle and First Lady Regina. This is followed very quickly by a cyanide contamination of part of Washington DC’s water supply and the apparent suicide by cyanide ingestion of a Saudi couple in a hotel room. While Alex Cross manages to question a suspect involved with the kidnapping, he is kept out of the case for the vital first 24 hours. He only learns some time later of communication from the kidnapper: no ransom, just a personal threat to the President. Patterson gives us an interesting, if perhaps a bit clichéd, perspective on life in America from the viewpoint of a Saudi terrorist. As well as the cyanide contamination of the water supply, Patterson touches on Sarin gas and Semtex explosive in Subway trains. Alex Cross seems a bit arrogant first off, but shows hints of the character we came to love in earlier books. The plot, however, is rather anticlimactic, the kidnapper is a lamentably shallow character, and much of the dialogue is wooden: “Tell me what’s happened, Ron,” the president commanded Director Burns. “Tell me everything, right now.” How Cross & co actually located the children is skimmed over; Cross is not involved in the terrorist aspect at all, and this seems to fizzle out; and as for Kill Alex Cross, nothing is mentioned of this until 17 pages from the end. This novel still has Patterson’s trademark short chapters, and there is liberal use of exclamation marks, but it feels like Patterson isn’t really interested in Alex Cross any more, like he’s not putting much effort into a hero who has made him a lot of money and has (or, rather, had) a large following. This mistitled instalment of Alex Cross is a disappointment and not even close to the quality of the early titles.