Edoardo Ballerini gives an impeccable performance of Isabel Allende’s excursion into contemporary crime fiction. Teenager Amanda searches for connections among a series of hideous real-world murders with the help of her grandfather, Blake, and a group of Internet gamers playing a mystery game called Ripper. Ballerini makes individuals of each of Amanda’s fellow online players, including Esmeralda, a boy from New Zealand who’s in a wheelchair, and a boy genius who uses—of course—Sherlock Holmes as his persona. Other intriguing characters include Amanda’s divorced parents—her mother, a shamanistic healer, and her father, a homicide detective—as well as two of her mother’s suitors, wealthy, intense Alan and former Navy SEAL Ryan. As Amanda obsesses over each grisly killing, Ballerini provides first-rate listening. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine
Ripper: A Novel
Narrated by Edoardo Ballerini
Isabel AllendeUnabridged — 14 hours, 28 minutes
Ripper: A Novel
Narrated by Edoardo Ballerini
Isabel AllendeUnabridged — 14 hours, 28 minutes
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Overview
Isabel Allende-the New York Times bestselling author whose books, including Maya's Notebook, Island Beneath the Sea, and Zorro, have sold more than 57 million copies around the world-demonstrates her remarkable literary versatility with Ripper, an atmospheric, fast-paced mystery involving a brilliant teenage sleuth who must unmask a serial killer in San Francisco.
The Jackson women, Indiana and Amanda, have always had each other. Yet, while their bond is strong, mother and daughter are as different as night and day. Indiana, a beautiful holistic healer, is a free-spirited bohemian. Long divorced from Amanda's father, she's reluctant to settle down with either of the men who want her-Alan, the wealthy scion of one of San Francisco's elite families, and Ryan, an enigmatic, scarred former Navy SEAL.
While her mom looks for the good in people, Amanda is fascinated by the dark side of human nature, like her father, the SFPD's Deputy Chief of Homicide. Brilliant and introverted, the MIT-bound high school senior is a natural-born sleuth addicted to crime novels and Ripper, the online mystery game she plays with her beloved grandfather and friends around the world.
When a string of strange murders occurs across the city, Amanda plunges into her own investigation, discovering, before the police do, that the deaths may be connected. But the case becomes all too personal when Indiana suddenly vanishes. Could her mother's disappearance be linked to the serial killer? Now, with her mother's life on the line, the young detective must solve the most complex mystery she's ever faced before it's too late.
Editorial Reviews
For Amanda Martin and her friends, Ripper was just a suspenseful online role-playing mystery game. Then the digital murders seem to take on an alarming new real-world dimension when the group discerns that they can detect the work of a serial killer even before the police do. Isabel Allende's new novel invites you into a world teeming with possible suspects and could-be victims, all portrayed with her inimitable touch. A welcome genre leap for one of the most talented and popular writers of our time.
12/23/2013
Bestseller Allende (The House of the Spirits) successfully tries her hand at a mystery, which features an unlikely team of sleuths united by an online mystery game named after the infamous Whitechapel murderer. High school senior Amanda Martín is the games master for a group that includes her grandfather, Blake Jackson; a wheelchair-bound New Zealand boy with the online persona of a Gypsy girl named Esmeralda; and a 13-year-old boy with a high IQ who calls himself Sherlock Holmes. Amanda persuades her cohorts to investigate real-life crimes in 2012 San Francisco, starting with the murder of Ed Staton, a school security guard. A month earlier, Amanda's astrologer godmother predicted that San Francisco would suffer a bloodbath. The prophecy seems more credible when other murders follow Staton's. While this genre outing isn't as memorable as the author's more groundbreaking fiction, her facility with plotting and pacing will keep readers turning the pages. 7-city author tour. Agent: Carmen Balcells, Carmen Balcells Agency. (Feb.)
Allende’s tightly plotted tale of crimes obvious and masked is sharply perceptive, utterly charming, and intensely suspenseful.” — Booklist, starred review
“A rip-roaring, entertaining crime novel. . . . Allende remains a remarkable spinner of stories. Her prose is sparkling and graceful . . . her ability to portray passion and action undimmed. Ripper grabs you, toys with you, amuses you…” — Minneapolis Star Tribune
“The novelist’s charming first murder mystery features an irresistible teenage sleuth.” — New York Times Book Review, Editor's Choice
“Thoroughly charming book. . . . A lot of fun to read.” — New York Times Book Review
“Literary icon Isabel Allende mesmerizes with her first crime novel…this race-against-the-clock thriller is pure magic.” — People Magazine, Four Stars
“Appealing characters, a fast-paced plot, and a successfully imagined killer add up to great entertainment.” — Library Journal
“[Allende’s] facility with plotting and pacing will keep readers turning the pages.” — Publishers Weekly
“It must have been surprising to discover that [Allende’s] particular literary strengths - a talent for dramatization, a delight in world-building and a passion for investigating relationships between family members - lend themselves so well to a genre she’s never bothered with before. I am hoping she’ll continue her killings.” — San Francisco Chronicle
“There are deliciously creepy elements in Ripper, much like those in the dark Scandinavian crime novels one of its characters loves.” — Seattle Times
“Allende doesn’t miss a beat, smoothly exposing the underbelly of the city and the shenanigans of its wealthy elite. You might guess the identity of the killer before the last pages, but you won’t care-the shocks and unexpected twists will keep you riveted until the end.” — More magazine
“Like many of Allende books it’s a joy to read with sentences to savor and read aloud. An excellent novel, RIPPER is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.” — I Love a Mystery (Blog)
There are deliciously creepy elements in Ripper, much like those in the dark Scandinavian crime novels one of its characters loves.
Literary icon Isabel Allende mesmerizes with her first crime novel…this race-against-the-clock thriller is pure magic.
A rip-roaring, entertaining crime novel. . . . Allende remains a remarkable spinner of stories. Her prose is sparkling and graceful . . . her ability to portray passion and action undimmed. Ripper grabs you, toys with you, amuses you…
It must have been surprising to discover that [Allende’s] particular literary strengths - a talent for dramatization, a delight in world-building and a passion for investigating relationships between family members - lend themselves so well to a genre she’s never bothered with before. I am hoping she’ll continue her killings.
Allende’s tightly plotted tale of crimes obvious and masked is sharply perceptive, utterly charming, and intensely suspenseful.
Allende doesn’t miss a beat, smoothly exposing the underbelly of the city and the shenanigans of its wealthy elite. You might guess the identity of the killer before the last pages, but you won’t care-the shocks and unexpected twists will keep you riveted until the end.
The novelist’s charming first murder mystery features an irresistible teenage sleuth.
It must have been surprising to discover that [Allende’s] particular literary strengths - a talent for dramatization, a delight in world-building and a passion for investigating relationships between family members - lend themselves so well to a genre she’s never bothered with before. I am hoping she’ll continue her killings.
Like many of Allende books it’s a joy to read with sentences to savor and read aloud. An excellent novel, RIPPER is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
Literary icon Isabel Allende mesmerizes with her first crime novel…this race-against-the-clock thriller is pure magic.
Allende doesn’t miss a beat, smoothly exposing the underbelly of the city and the shenanigans of its wealthy elite. You might guess the identity of the killer before the last pages, but you won’t care-the shocks and unexpected twists will keep you riveted until the end.
09/01/2013
As with 2013's Maya's Notebook, Allende departs for somewhat darker territory and features an adolescent heroine. Amanda Jackson identifies less with her good-hearted mother than with her father, divorced from her mother and the SFPD's deputy chief of homicide. A fan of crime fiction and the online mystery game Ripper, MIT-bound Amanda indulges in a little investigating when murder starts breaking out all over town. Then her mother disappears. With a seven-city tour.
Edoardo Ballerini gives an impeccable performance of Isabel Allende’s excursion into contemporary crime fiction. Teenager Amanda searches for connections among a series of hideous real-world murders with the help of her grandfather, Blake, and a group of Internet gamers playing a mystery game called Ripper. Ballerini makes individuals of each of Amanda’s fellow online players, including Esmeralda, a boy from New Zealand who’s in a wheelchair, and a boy genius who uses—of course—Sherlock Holmes as his persona. Other intriguing characters include Amanda’s divorced parents—her mother, a shamanistic healer, and her father, a homicide detective—as well as two of her mother’s suitors, wealthy, intense Alan and former Navy SEAL Ryan. As Amanda obsesses over each grisly killing, Ballerini provides first-rate listening. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine
2013-11-17
A seasoned hand at the intimate Latin American literary novel and young-adult fantasy takes an ungainly stab at a page-turner about a serial killer. This loose, overstuffed crime story from Allende (Maya's Notebook, 2013, etc.) is set in San Francisco, where teenage heroine Amanda is navigating two problems. First is the split between her mom, Indiana, a gorgeous New-Age healer, and her dad, the SFPD's deputy homicide chief. The second problem is the spate of grotesque murders in the city, over which Amanda obsesses online with a group of fellow geeks with a mordant streak. (Allende refers to such Internet activity as a game called Ripper, but the "game" seems hardly distinct from a chat room.) While Amanda attempts to connect the murders to one killer, Indiana ponders whether to give her affections to a wealthy but shiftless socialite or a former Navy SEAL with PTSD. There are repeated references in the book to Scandinavian crime fiction, and Allende has clearly taken inspiration from the general outlines of the genre: the gory, imaginatively murdered corpses, the whip-smart young female hero, the cynicism about law enforcement institutions. But Allende struggles with pacing and tone. The novel is overlong and thick with clichés both in the prose and the characters; the most carefully drawn character, Indiana, is prone to a flightiness that seems largely designed to serve plot points. Allende crafts some thoughtful brief sketches of San Francisco subcultures, from high-end mansions to rough-and-tumble drag queens, and she cleverly unifies the murders in the closing chapters. But by then, the characters and plot turns feel so familiar that a late-breaking tragedy has little emotional effect. Credit Allende for attempting to expand her range, but crime fiction is plainly not her forte.
Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940170411856 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | HarperCollins Publishers |
| Publication date: | 01/28/2014 |
| Edition description: | Unabridged |
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