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lynguy1's review
3.0
Deliberate Duplicity by David Rohling is a police procedural set in and around the cities of Bloomington and Normal, Illinois. It features Chief Detective Sasha Frank and an array of law enforcement officers in the area as well as the criminals. When a couple are found dead, without clothing and jewelry and posed along the Constitution Trail, Sasha is called to the scene. With no clues on why the couple were killed and additional bodies show up along the trail, Sasha and the team must pursue every thread to identify the killer.
Sasha is a 34 year veteran with the Bloomington police department and is normally calm, polite, and clear-headed. However, as time goes on and stress builds, there are cracks in his demeanor. This made his character feel real and helped me to better connect with him. The other characters had varying amounts of depth, but it was adequate for book one in a series. The reader also gets insight into the killer’s mind which was disturbing, but added to the suspense.
The plot is well done with lots of unknowns and a twist. While I did determine who the criminal mastermind was, it took a while to see what the motivation was for the killings. One of the fascinating things about this book was the interactions of the characters as the stress built. Small things antagonized them as frustration at lack of clues and political pressure built. Eighteen hour work days, lack of sleep and lots of caffeine didn’t help matters.
Overall, this book is entertaining and intriguing. It is also the first book in the Detective Sasha Frank Mysteries series. I am looking forward to reading book two when it is available.
I won a digital copy of this book from River Grove Books and the author in a Goodreads Giveaway. Opinions are mine alone and are not biased in any way.
Sasha is a 34 year veteran with the Bloomington police department and is normally calm, polite, and clear-headed. However, as time goes on and stress builds, there are cracks in his demeanor. This made his character feel real and helped me to better connect with him. The other characters had varying amounts of depth, but it was adequate for book one in a series. The reader also gets insight into the killer’s mind which was disturbing, but added to the suspense.
The plot is well done with lots of unknowns and a twist. While I did determine who the criminal mastermind was, it took a while to see what the motivation was for the killings. One of the fascinating things about this book was the interactions of the characters as the stress built. Small things antagonized them as frustration at lack of clues and political pressure built. Eighteen hour work days, lack of sleep and lots of caffeine didn’t help matters.
Overall, this book is entertaining and intriguing. It is also the first book in the Detective Sasha Frank Mysteries series. I am looking forward to reading book two when it is available.
I won a digital copy of this book from River Grove Books and the author in a Goodreads Giveaway. Opinions are mine alone and are not biased in any way.
skullsnbats's review
3.0
Illinois abolished the death penalty in 2011 so having characters worry about getting the death penalty was a jarring error and brought me out of the story. It was pretty engaging otherwise
booklvrkat's review
2.0
It will take you a l o n g time to get into the meat of this story. It's a bit difficult to understand and I cannot figure out why? Maybe it's simply the sentence structures, it could be on the writer. Lots of talking at the beginning made it seem more like a screenplay vs. a book. LOTS of extra wording & definitions wer added either as a description, or when the author was looking up terms? IMHO this story will confuse you significantly until the last quarter of the game.
Thank you to BFFriends for the electronic copy.
Thank you to BFFriends for the electronic copy.
milesofpages's review
3.0
Deliberate Duplicity:
I felt like it took me a minute to really get into the story. I felt like the initial crime scene and questioning took so long because it was a lot of back and forth simple dialogue. For instance, when Beff was talking about the first victims, she would say in her report, “as you know it means this”. The definitions were unnecessary to me because If I didn’t know it, I could google it. I felt like it took away from the flow of dialogue with having to explain every medical term. Also, there are approximately 492 police officers we meet. We get a little tid bit about them. I just wanted the facts of the case if 491 of them didn’t come back up in the story. Once I got past it and we got into the plot of the book, it was great!
Sasha Frank is a hilarious detective. As my father would say, “would you like some water for my dry sense of humor”
I felt like it took me a minute to really get into the story. I felt like the initial crime scene and questioning took so long because it was a lot of back and forth simple dialogue. For instance, when Beff was talking about the first victims, she would say in her report, “as you know it means this”. The definitions were unnecessary to me because If I didn’t know it, I could google it. I felt like it took away from the flow of dialogue with having to explain every medical term. Also, there are approximately 492 police officers we meet. We get a little tid bit about them. I just wanted the facts of the case if 491 of them didn’t come back up in the story. Once I got past it and we got into the plot of the book, it was great!
Sasha Frank is a hilarious detective. As my father would say, “would you like some water for my dry sense of humor”
jill_rey's review
4.0
Deliberate Duplicity is a heavily involved murder mystery that is sure to keep your eyes wide open throughout its entirety, pun intended. The author uniquely wastes no time quickly and fully summarizing each character introduced, and there are a lot of characters. This highly detailed summary often deluges such details as to the origin of the person’s name and marital history. While this may cause readers’ heads to spin as they grasp at all the detail, the particulars of each character come back into play in otherwise unimaginably unique ways later in the story, indicating an exceptionally thought out and thorough writing style.
As the first book in Rohlfing’s Detective Sasha Frank Mystery Series, it offers enough intrigue, mystery and skilled writing style to entice readers back for more. This powerful debut, set in the Midwest, gives readers a creepy, entirely thorough and nearly perfectly planned murder…nearly.
*Disclaimer: A review copy was provided by the publisher. All opinions are my own.
As the first book in Rohlfing’s Detective Sasha Frank Mystery Series, it offers enough intrigue, mystery and skilled writing style to entice readers back for more. This powerful debut, set in the Midwest, gives readers a creepy, entirely thorough and nearly perfectly planned murder…nearly.
*Disclaimer: A review copy was provided by the publisher. All opinions are my own.
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