Dear Mr. Edwards,
Here we are again. I last wrote to you in my review of The Magpies last year. I said a lot of nice things because you penned one hell of a book. Well, guess what? I hate to swell that head of yours, but Follow You Home trumps The Magpies. Not to pressure you, but The Devil’s Work is going to have to be exceedingly phenomenal to beat this one. Don’t let me down.
52 Pickup. Yes sir, this book reminded me of that great old card game my big brother used to pull on me when we were kids. He would drop and scatter a deck of cards and I got to pick them up and make them neat again. You wrote Follow You Home in the manner of 52 pickup in slow motion. You teased us for half the book sloooowly scattering about those many curious pieces of the story, frightening us in the process with your trademark unrelenting suspense. God, my fingernails are a mess from chewing them to pieces. You are getting the bill for the manicure, Mr. Edwards. With each of your little chapters you sprung more and more stuff on me and my very smart book buddy. It got to the point where I was totally stumped and honestly could see no way for you to emerge looking brilliant as there was clearly no way for this story to work out in the end. No way. What a mess of a situation for poor Daniel and Laura. It made the Magpie people look like simple whiners. Well, then in the second half you started to tease us mercilessly with little clues and little twisties one after another, and still no light bulbs in my head. I hate when you do that, Mr. Edwards. You made me feel utterly stupid! I signed up for Brain HQ while reading this book. I’ll am going to send you that bill too.
As the info bites and surprises continued, on and on and on, I finally started thinking, hey, perhaps there is a way for Mr. Edwards to salvage some sort of believable ending to this tale. For purposes of full disclosure I must admit I changed my mind about a dozen times, but finally got real comfy in my take of the situation. Then you blew it all up in my face!!! OMG! What?? Are you kidding me??? I nearly screamed with delight in how you got me again! But, by golly, I was badly duped. How can you sleep at night knowing you do that to your readers?
I do get to throw this at you: how could you not bless Daniel with more brains? He did a lot of terribly naïve and downright stupid things, Mr. Edwards! Do you expect us to believe some of his actions/nonactions? The good news though is that I forgive you as you entertained me. Tremendously.
I love you, Mr. Edwards.
Now go back into your little office and get to work, you! I’m waiting…
Your forever fan,
Christine XOXO