Therapy

Another Alex Delaware novel comes to life under Kellerman's skilled hand, churning out a riveting plot and adventure based on a young couple's murder in the Los Angeles hills. The savage murder and missing identity of the young woman involved lands the case in Alex Delaware's lap, involving him in a series of clues which brings him in conflict with a popular celebrity psychologist's Therapy cases.

surely keep you turning those pages. The shocking murder of two young lovers on Mulholland Drive starts the wheels of justice turning in the forms of Alex Delaware and his buddy Det. Milo Sturgis. The latest in the Delaware series is just as fresh as the first. And it moves along with amazing speed; keeping the reader chasing along behind trying to keep up with the churning thoughts in the minds of these two analytical geniuses.I find this the most interesting part of Kellerman's novels: the gathering of facts and the unwrapping of the package that is the conclusion. Another facet that I enjoy, is the way he describes each character down to his shoelaces or the way she is wearing her hair. And the neighborhoods we accompany them to come alive with home styles and scenery. Unimportant to some, but to me it turns a novel into a striking visual concept which adds life to the written word.When you put interesting characters; both the good and the bad; a great story line and descriptive prose together with Jonathan Kellerman at the helm; you are steered into a sea of adventure and enjoyment. A good one; not one you would want to miss!

I like John Rubinstein the actor but John Rubinstein the reader is horrible. Got this book on CD and am going to get the hard cover edition of the book because John is doing a horrible job. It is an art to read a story to someone listening. He just doesn't have it and is ruining the book for me. It appears that Jonathan Kellerman has written another good Alex Delaware story. It is a good read just not a good listen.

A young man and woman are found dead, both shot at close range in the head, the woman, in addition to being shot, is impaled by a metal spike. Homicide detective Milo Sturgis responds the call and brings his good friend, psychologist, Alex Delaware with him.The crime scene holds no information about the young woman, but the man is found to be Gavin Quick, a troubled soul whose past landed him on a therapist's couch. Alex begins looking into Gavin's background to find a man who, once he suffered a major head-injury, had wild mood swings and began obsessing about certain woman. As a result of an incident with a woman he admired, Gavin was forced to see Dr. Mary Lou Koppel, a popular psychologist who guards the privacy of her patient...alive or dead. Alex desperately needs the help of Dr. Koppel, but her resistance to divulge information leaves him cold, until a shocking discovery has him questioning her about the death of another patient of hers years before.Alex and Milo start digging through Gavin's past only to find more questions that need answering, until another woman is found impaled and the investigation takes a surprising turn.`Therapy' is the best Alex Delaware book is years. Once begun the book can't be put down. Expert pacing and a masterful plot will keep you racing through the pages to find out who did it and why. Jonathan Kellerman has made the psychological thriller genre his own and `Therapy', his most powerful and suspenseful novel, shows him at the top of his game.Set aside some time because you'll be up all night reading to discover who did it and why!Nick Gonnella

Clinical psychologist and LAPD consultant Alex Delaware and his friend Detective Milo Sturgis are having dinner at a restaurant in Beverly Glen when by happenstance the wail of police sirens alerts them to a nearby double homicide. When they arrive at the scene, the victims are a suggestively undressed young man and woman sitting in a red Mustang convertible parked in a secluded driveway; they have both been shot in the head at close range and in addition the woman has been impaled on an iron stake. The male victim's driver's license identifies him as Gavin Quick, but there is no identification for his blond companion. When Alex and Milo arrive at Gavin's home to notify his family of his murder, his mother Sheila is home alone; his father Jerry is a scrap metals dealer who is on a business trip and his older sister Kelly is a first year law student at Boston University. After Sheila overcomes her shock and grief, she manages to briefly summarize for them the recent events in Gavin's life, which revolve around the brain injuries which he received as a passenger in a car during an accident in which two of his friends were killed. The resultant personality changes and mental impairment had led Gavin to drop out of college and receive both occupational and psychological counseling. Sheila incorrectly assumes that the blond with Gavin was Kayla Bartell, a former girlfriend from an upscale Beverly Hills neighborhood whose misidentification provides some difficult moments for Alex and Milo. In some respects, this is a straightforward police procedural, but there are so many interwoven threads and layers that gradually reveal themselves that pursuing the case is more like assembling a complex jigsaw puzzle without a picture to guide them than simply peeling back the proverbial layers of an onion. Their inability to establish the identity of the second victim until very late in the investigation is not only troubling, but leaves the motivation behind the murders more problematical. Furthermore, Alex is troubled when he discovers that Gavin's therapist was Mary Lou Koppel, a media savvy psychologist well known through her talk radio program and someone with whom he had a previous disturbing professional experience. His and Milo's antennae figuatively quiver when they discover that Flora Newsome, another patient of Mary Lou's, had been violently murdered approximately one year ago in a crime with some superficial similarities to the recent homicides. They are further intrigued by the inconsistencies which gradually develop in the stories of the various individuals involved. Jerry, Gavin's father; Eileen Paxton, Sheila's sister and Gavin's aunt; Mary Lou; her associate and Gavin's original therapist, Franco Gull; Gavin's neurologist Dr. Singh and Ray Nichols, Flora's ex, not only seem to have quite divergent views of the events preceding the deaths of Gavin and Flora but also appear to be less than wholly truthful. As you might imagine, when Mary Lou Koppel