Reviews

Paul Copeland’s sister was brutally murder 20 years ago in the woods with 4 other campers. At least that’s what he thought until the body of one of those campers mysterious turns up, not with decades of decay but mere hours. We get to follow Paul as he unravels mystery after mystery. Victoria and I listened to the book together after watching several Netflix adaptations of Harlan Coben’s novels. This book was great and kept us guessing right up to the final chapters. We thoroughly enjoyed spending time on long car rides listening to The Woods.

4.5 out of 5

cekisha's review against another edition

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2.0

Meh. This is how I felt when I finished the book. And 'meh' is never good, because it means that the book wasn't able to even provoke some stronger emotion.

The book started out as an easy read, and it was interesting until I realized that it was just going on and on, I was becoming bored and I even stopped caring about the case. The main case about the wood is the reason why the whole book is doomed to be 'meh'. I thought that maybe I was being unfair to Mr Coben because his book hadn't lived up to my perverse expectations, (I guess nowadays we are simply accustomed/or forced to be accustomed to the terrible crimes), but this one was simply nothing special. The other crime about the raped African-American girl that was going on at the same time was also boring and I didn't care about it and I guess it existed only to make the book longer. The end was also left vague, the main male character can be described as a dull and indifferent man. The action is also slow-paced, no interesting evidence, the characters are stereotypical, to cut the long story short, nothing interesting was going on.

Just a big meh.

remjunior's review against another edition

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4.0

So, Harlan Coben is basically my go-to for long car rides with my wife. He isn't the best writer in a technical or linguistic sense, but his stories always have a decent mystery and are fun to listen to. In the realm of pulp fiction, I can safely say this is a good book. He gets a bit too deep into his webs of mystery and it can be kind of annoying at times, but it all becomes clear by the end. Anyway, it was a fun read.

fibuzz's review against another edition

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3.0

This is the tale of a murder and missing persons revisited years later when the past comes back to haunt those involved. The book had all the hallmarks of a novel I was likely to enjoy and indeed, the first few chapters are compelling and drew me straight in. It kept me entertained and turning the pages throughout but the ending was disappointing with plot twists that felt gratuitous and not at all real to the story. I didn't dislike it but a fairly mediocre read for me personally. It won't stop me checking out other Coben books however, THAT many fans can't be wrong, but this was not my favourite by this author.

lynxman_44's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional informative mysterious sad tense medium-paced

4.25

mikec363's review against another edition

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3.0

First Coben book I’ve read. I guess I need to give it 3 because I read it in less than a week so it held my interest enough. The problem is that it just gets more and more absurd and significantly worse as it progresses. The tone is all over the place, the dialogue is ridiculous, gratuitous pop culture references, and none of the characters ever just get to the fucking point. So much unnecessary stuff could have been edited from this. Also, the main character will go from loving family man and old flame to smug asshole with no rhyme or reason behind it. Again, not an awful book but a very flawed one.

clsears's review against another edition

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mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

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