 | |
 View Larger |
Zapped (Regan Reilly Mysteries, No. 11) By Carol Higgins Clark ( Scribner )
Release Date: 2008-04-08
Average Customer Rating:
List Price: $24.00
Price: $17.52
Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25.
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
|  Add to Cart |
|
|
Product Description
It's a hot, humid July night in New York City. Where were you when the lights went out?A New York City resident for many years, Carol Higgins Clark was there during the blackout of 2003. Not surprisingly, she felt that Regan and Jack Reilly should one day share the experience! As Zapped begins, the Reillys return home from a summer weekend to the loft in Tribeca they are in the agonizing process of renovating and expanding. They are looking forward to a quiet supper on their newly acquired rooftop terrace. But it's not meant to be. While Jack goes to pick up Chinese food, Regan enters their apartment, unaware that a nervous thief, who preceded her by minutes, is hiding in the front closet. A thief who knows about a hidden safe that Regan and Jack have yet to discover. Minutes later, the blackout strikes, and both Reillys are called into action. A new gallery in SoHo, featuring treasured glass sculptures from all over the world, has been burglarized. As head of the NYPD Major Case Squad, Jack oversees several departments. Art theft is one of them. PI Regan hears from her best friend, Kit, who is in Manhattan on business. She's been abandoned at a comedy club by a colleague from an insurance convention, Georgina Mathieson, who ran out for a cigarette moments before the blackout struck and never came back. Kit gets a call that Georgina is disturbed and dangerous. Fueled by her rage at a college boyfriend who dumped her, Georgina seeks revenge on unsuspecting young blond men. She was last seen getting into a cab outside the club -- with a tall blond. Regan heads the search for Georgina and her potential victim. Meanwhile, Lorraine Lily, an almost famous actress, returns to New York City the night of the blackout, after spending three months in England doing a play, and is informed by her estranged husband, Conrad Spreckles, that he'd sold his loft to their next-door neighbors, the Reillys. Lorraine had never told him about the hidden safe she'd had installed in the closet. If she doesn't get back what's in there, she's sure her budding career will be ruined. In Zapped, Clark takes readers on a tour of the city they won't forget and introduces them to a wonderful cast of colorful, eccentric characters whose stories intersect in precarious and often humorous ways during one very dark and hot summer night.
|
|
 Written for the teenage audience ( bcrhoades )
This is the second book in the Regan Reilly Mystery series that I have read (listened to). I enjoy her mother's work but Carol Higgins Clark is not the writer her mother, Mary Higgins Clark is. Don't believe that the daughter can write, just because her mother can.
The book never really got into a real mystery story, in my humble opinion. And, there were so many characters that I couldn't keep them all straight. ZAPPED left me feeling like it was written for a teenager reader.
A black out in New York City is the setting but instead of focusing on one mystery (problem), there were several. They included a gal drugging a guy to get revenge, stolen art glass, a divorcing couple, a computer geek, an apartment being renovated and a secret safe. Ms. Clark wove all these unrelated stories together so they all merged in the end but it was just too confusing for me to follow in a story that held my interest.
The main character of Regan Reilly and her husband, Jack, are a bigger than life couple. Regan is a detective and Jack is a cop. Between them, nothing seems impossible. It is just all too storybook for my tastes.
Ms. Higgins is the reader and there is nothing better than the author reading their own work. They know the inflections they wish the characters to have on certain words/sentences.
If you want to read a light, nonsensical book, ZAPPED is it. If you want a mystery to "get your teeth into", pick another book.
|
 Fun and exciting Regan Reilly story ( honeymooners96 )
I was surprised to see so many negative reviews for this book. I don't think Carol Higgins Clark is trying unsuccessfully to be her mother. I think she is just writing her own fun mysteries. Sure there's a lot of coincidences that just plain wouldn't happen in real life, but the Regan Reilly series is heartwarming and funny and that's what I look for in a mystery.
|
 stop talking ( jcaikane )
It's obvious the author doesn't read these reviews as she does nothing to make change. I don't have a problem with the things most people have complained about. CHC writes cozys, fluff, not great mysteries. Once you accept that, these stories become acceptable. I listen to the audio tapes in the car as I don't have the time to sit & read. This brings me to my problem with CHC. For heaven sake STOP READING THEM YOURSELF. You have an irritating voice, you can't do accents & you read as if you were talking to five year olds. You may be an "actress" but, that doesn't mean you're good at audio narration. I didn't enjoy MHC's books when the author or CHC read them as much as when someone else read them. So, stop talking, spend the money & hire a professional. I would have rated this higher but her voice & is so off putting I find it hard to enjoy the story. This will probably be my last purchase of a CHC book.
|
Who knew so much was going on during that blackout? ( ralphwhite )
One thing for sure about Carol Higgins Clark's books, you sure do get a swarm of characters. In Zapped they enter and depart the stage just long enough to display one or two facets of their character. Like flakes in a snowstorm, no sooner do you think you make one out than another looms into view. In addition to our old friends, Regan and Jack, we have Kit and Billy, who linked up at a comedy club during the New York blackout; we have Lorraine, the soon-to-be divorcee just back from London; we have Clay, Lorraine's friend and accomplice; then there's Chip and Georgina, prey and predator, respectively, there's Wally and Arthur, the renovation contractor and his safe-cracker friend; there's Larry, of Larry's Laughs. There's also a Billy, a Kent, a Becky, a Frank, a Rod, Gail the Gossip, and of course Mr. Spreckles (Conrad) and both the first (Lorraine) and second (Penny) Mrs. Spreckles. Oh, Chip may not be Chip's real name, and Rose is definitely not Georgina's real name. And as our snowflakes begin forming up together and CHC's plot forms around them, they become more familiar to us and we become more comfortable with them. If you accept these characters into your life, you will start wondering where the action will have progressed when the lights come on. This is the unspoken source of the writer's creative tension and a key element of her craft. At 225 pages it's a quick read and a fun little entry-level thriller. Enjoy!
|
what garbage
how can carol higgins clark show her face in public after this book? her mother is a much better writer. does she even consult her mother before writng? i read someother books by her and they were better. the only expalntion for this book would be she was taking some of those knockout drugs she wrote about in this book.the characters go out of thier way to find a woman who is going to brand a man. they do not know them. why does the brand say i am snake? why does she brand blond men? are they cows? where would you buy this? also the guy's parents can drive in from maine through a blackout? they have to go through new jersey which was also in a blackoout in this book. what about highway lights and traffic signals?
how did everyone from the other states make it over the bridge? unbelievable.
|
|
|
