First Family
by David Baldacci
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Book Reviews of First Family
Book Review: Sean King and Michelle Maxwell are BACK!!
Summary: 5 Stars
Return to the old Baldacci writing formula-San King and Michelle Maxwell are Back!
In First Family Mr. Baldacci returns to his old writing formula of Sean King and Michelle Maxwell as they investigate and deal with Washington political intrigue. I know many readers like the Camel Club series, but I am more partial to Mr. Baldacci's original style and characters. He just seems more comfortable and believable writing about the inside world of the Secret Service and Washington. First Family is a complex tale that is really 3 linked stories in one. The primary thesis is the kidnapping of Willa, the niece of the First Lady. The second interwoven story concerns the murder of Michelle Maxwell's mother. And the final connected story concerns the despicable actions of both the President and First Lady. Woven together Mr. Baldacci crafts a tale of intrigue, murder, deceit, hate, love and sadness in the emotionally charged world of Washington D.C.; where power is everything and integrity means nothing. In this emotionally charged environment King and Maxwell must somehow find the elusive truth of who and why evil deeds are done. Their quest for that truth will lead them to the highest center of corruption that Washington D.C. has become.
Superb character development. We meet again Sean and Michelle and all the baggage that they bring with them. I like how Mr. Baldacci dug into Michelle's past and fleshed out just who she is. That side story gave enhanced credibility to the main story by defining just who Sean and Michelle are and why they are believable investigators. The slow character development of the kidnappers is also excellently done and makes one empathize with why they did what they did.
No gratuitous language, sex or violence.
Recommended. Like Mr. Baldacci's other King and Maxwell books, this one will keep you engaged throughout. There are no dead pages or filler chapters. The story will hold your interest and it is tough to put this book down. I am very happy to see that Mr. Baldacci has returned to his writing roots. I eagerly look forward to the next King and Maxwell adventure.
Book Review: First Family Intrigue
Summary: 4 Stars
David Baldacci is one of the more recognized writers today and known for his character driven stories and a lot of action. Yet First Family is the first Baldacci novel I've had the pleasure of reading. It took only a few pages to recognize why he's so popular.
First Family is the fourth in a series involving characters Sean King and Michelle Maxwell, former Secret Service agents that now share a partnership as Washington D.C. private investigators. I'm sure there is some back story I missed by starting with book four, yet Baldacci provided enough insight into the characters to give me an understanding of who they are and their personal issues. The plot itself is stand alone and introduces an assortment of new characters.
The 12-year-old niece of First Lady Jane Cox is kidnapped following a birthday party at Camp David. King and Maxwell are hired to investigate, much to the obvious disapproval of the Secret Service and FBI. Meanwhile, we follow 62-year-old Sam Quarry, eventually discovering his involvement with the story from his compound in Alabama, called Atlee.
Baldacci throws in several plot twists as well as twisting our feelings and perceptions of characters. I enjoy novels in which things do not seem as they are, and First Family has that same that same form of attraction.
The story is full of scandals involving murder, high politics, and national security. The novel also creates believable scenarios depicting Secret Service and FBI procedures.
First Family is a long story, but it did not give me the feeling of hoping it ends soon. In contrast, it did give me the feeling of wanting to read the previous three novels in the series.
Book Review: Three Mysteries for the Price of One and Lots of Surprises
Summary: 3 Stars
Just for the record, the Kindle price for this book was $9.99 at the time I wrote this review.
If you liked Simple Genius, you'll find that First Family has many of the same appeals as well as a return of Sean King and Michelle Maxwell. This time Michelle closes in on the source of her childhood trauma . . . despite being ambivalent about finding out. The pair is overloaded with mysteries as the President's niece is kidnapped, the President's sister-in-law is murdered, and Michelle's mother is also killed. From the beginning, you'll follow the kidnappers but their motivation will be a mystery as well until near the end of the book. The book's key theme is the inevitability of justice being done . . . in one way or another.
The story starts pretty slowly but picks up speed around the middle. A good editor could have carved this book down by 150 pages, and it would have been a four-star novel. The remaining weakness is that Mr. Baldacci likes to exaggerate his characters just a little bit too much. As a result, they don't ring true in most cases. That makes it hard to live within the story as opposed to read about the characters. I thought that the mystery of Michelle's mother's death was pretty well done while the rest of the story was unnecessarily ponderous and sluggish. The best character in the book is the intelligent, resourceful, and poised kidnapped niece, Willa Dutton. The villain, Sam Quarry, is pretty entertaining as well for his contradictions. A book populated with more such characters that moved at a faster pace would have been a lot more fun.
Keep digging until you get to the bottom of every mystery!
Book Review: Fun but inconsequent entertainment...
Summary: 3 Stars
Admittedly, I'm a sucker for this sort of stuff, and devour it with the same gusto with which I attack a bag of cheese puffs. I've read every one of Baldacci's novels, and while I liked "First Family" better than several of his recent outings, it still doesn't hold a candle to "Absolute Power". (None of his novels do, actually.) There's a sort of industrial competence to the whole thing which makes it generically enjoyable (like the cheese puffs) but not something you'll remember for more than a day or so.
In the service of this tale we have:
A steely-eyed ex-Secret Service alpha male private investigator
His perpetually angry kick-butt ex-Secret Service gorgeous neurotic partner (who'd rather be an alpha male)
A wildly popular JFK/Reagan-mix President who's an amoral tailhound-rapist
His cold and calculating evil amoral First Lady who covers everything up
Two saintly brilliant children, one white, one black
A not-so-saintly brilliant redneck southern kidnapper with the engineering savvy of MIT's faculty
His dimwit son
A sourpuss FBI guy who really loves kids
A cheap slut
Various background scoundrels, Indians, adulterers, and cops
Predictable, perhaps, but engaging, and I read it in two sittings. I was surprised, however, to trip over a couple of third-grade grammatical typos. (You'd think an author of Baldacci's stature would rate a competent copy editor.)
Three stars, and I'll read his next novel for sure, although I really hope it's not Michelle and Sean again. Enough already.
Book Review: Just a review of the printed book.
Summary: 3 Stars
I'm not a kindle user, so am not involved in the controversy that makes up most of the reviews based upon it's Kindle price. This is simply a review of the book after reading it. And, I found it to be a decent thriller with one major flaw. Here's the upsides and downsides of it for me:
Upsides:
- I love the characters in this book: From "superheroes" Michelle, the blunt damaged secret service agent and Sean, her big more laid back partner to the evil-or-is-he-so-evil Quarry.
- Even though Michelle and Sean are from his previous book Simple Genius - this works just fine as a stand-alone thriller.
Downsides:
- The beginning was a little slow, though it picks up in the middle. (There's an interesting side-plot with Michelle in the middle that picked up the pace, but I expected it to connect more with the total story).
- The overall plot is mildly implausible, but that's alright given it's thriller nature and that there's Baldacci's writing to compensate. But, the ending just gets outrageously implausible. There's about 70 pages of it that go from one completely unbelievable action to another. I would just get through one thing that happened that I'd had to convince myself that "alright, maybe it's a little believable", before something even more outlandish would occur! The size of the "holes in the story"- just grew wider and wider!
BOTTOM LINE: A good page-turning premise and characters brought down to a just average thriller(and below what I expect from Baldacci) by some completely implausible action at the end.