The Thursday Club

ISBN 0671734482 - The best mysteries keep you guessing, trying to get a step or two ahead of the main character. The Thursday Club doesn't do that. Oddly, it's still a really good book. The body of a hooker who's been dead for 25 years turns up in a landfill. The lab guy looking at the bullet ends up dead. The cop he called before he died ends up dead. The cop HE called before he died, however, doesn't. Ben Rogers, once the partner of Felix Palmieri, the dead cop, is determined to figure out how a smart cop like Felix walks into a dead end alley and gets shot point blank in the chest. He takes up all of Felix's open cases, looking for a clue to his killer. At the same time, he's called upon by the new mayor to look into a possible problem with a political appointee. If you can read this, without being several steps ahead of Ben, you must be new to the genre. The hooker is presented first thing, and the clues for the rest of it are all too clearly laid out on the book flap. Even the very final riddle, one that isn't even mentioned until it's solved in the final five words of the book, is given away in the text. That's not what makes this good. The characters, the ones you like and those you don't, are what turns The Thursday Club from a mediocre whodunit into a worthwhile read. From Ben's grandmother to the snitches he uses, from his boss to the boss of bosses, the characters and their motives are clear and well-written. Murano and Hammer are a fantastic team.

The author does a good job of keeping the reader interested. The overall tempo of the plot is good. Murano ends his story with a nice surprise. The main character is easy to relate to. All the ideas for the plot are fresh.I bought it because it was bundled with John Grisham's THE FIRM. I ended up enjoying THE THURSDAY CLUB more. I have since re-read the THURSDAY CLUB a number of times. I have not once read THE FIRM again.I can confidently recommend this book to anyone who likes the crime/mystery/etc genre.I will not comment on the story itself. The little discussion of the story line a little further up on this page gives you enough of an idea.Enjoy.

THE THURSDAY CLUB KEEPS YOU INTERESTED FROM BEGINNING TO END. MURANO DID AN OUTSTANDING JOB.