Review: One of Prescott' s Finest Thrillers!
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 10 7, 2013
What a story!  We readers get a free education in Botany, Geology, Air Pollution, Profiling techniques  as well as an introduction to forensics. Prescott is a  good researcher. Some of the science left me in with a headache  but I carried on and the puzzle finally came together.The characters were well described.  Once again the author has chosen a female heroine, Donna, as a target victim for a serial killer aka "the Rag Doll Man". She is an FBI trained profiler on loan to the Corona Beach Police Dept.  To help solve a hideous murder of a teen prostitute.The evidence develops three possible  suspects,all of whom are CBPD police officers. The case is complicated by the fact that Donna has been intimately involved  with two of the three men she has profiled as possible suspects.Tension is created as the backgrounds of the three men are revealed. Mark Logan, a detective has become an alcoholic after losing his pregnant wife and unborn son in an auto accident. He meets Donna, begins a relationship and is just beginning to regain his sobriety when he discovers that she has been cheating on him with some one in CBPD. Donna immediately abandons her affair with Sgt. Joe Kurtz  and all of lives are thrown under the bus. Logan and Kurtz become bitter rivals over Donna.The third possibility is Ed Barnes whose wife of 30 years commits suicide. Barnes has a prior record of complaints from arrestees  of  police brutality. He was transferred to work in the police lab where he would have no contact with suspects.Prescott is a master of plot weaving, so much so that  I picked the wrong man for the Rag Doll Killer twice and for a retired PI of 40 years as well as having read a million crime novels I was mortified when the true killer was suddenly revealed.In my opinion the author is a fantastic story teller. I do have one nit to pick tho being a gun nut and that is the pistol that Prescott chose to arm the killer with. It is described as an Iver Johnson, nickel plated, .22 cal. 8 shot semi-auto pistol which had been modified in some manner to take a noise suppressor made from the mast of a TV  aerial.To those who are not familiar with this pistol you can find a video on You Tube under Iver Johnson  TP Series  . 22. CalIt has a 2.85 inch barrel and there is no hold back  on the slide which goes all the way forward to the muzzle after each shot and after the last shot. This means that attaching any thing to the front of this pistol without tapping threaded grooves into the barrel to accept a threaded hollow suppressor is only going to work one time if it works at all. And it may ruin your day.That is why real assassins use Rugers, Colt Woodsmen, Brownings, and Hi Standard .22's that can have partialSlides that do not go all the way to the muzzle.The TP Series Iver Johnson looks almost identical to the James Bond Walther PPK.  It is not accurate past 25feet It is basically a "last ditch get off me gun". It was made from 1982-1989 .Turning to the ammunition. .22cal bullets are small. They weigh from 36.grain to 40 grain. Might develop as much as 800 feet per second from a 2.85inch barrel . Not likely to have much knockdown power especially against a Kevlar vest. It would be felt, may be leave a bruise but you would still be in the fight.However, more people have been killed with this bullet in last century than any other caliber.All that aside, I loved the story and declare it a 5 STAR ride.Roger Shepherd