Book 37 Bloody River Blues by Jeffery Deaver

John Pellam is a location scout working on the set of a " Bonnie and Clyde " style movie in Maddocks, Missouri. When a random guy opens his car door and sends his beer crashing to the ground he becomes a wanted man in the connection with a murder and the shooting of a cop.

He becomes Missouri's most wanted man and everybody seems to want to track him down and to make sure that his mouth is kept firmly shut.


First of all I must say from the outset that thrillers are not normally my bag unless it happens to be somewhat special, so maybe a thriller addict would enjoy this a lot more than I did. I have only ever read one other Jeffery Deaver book and I enjoyed that one more. Apparently this is one of his earlier books and he does get much better. There is nothing terrible about ' Bloody River Blues' , it's just not great. It's just that everything about it is average. There is nothing original or fresh about this story and it is probably a storyline that has been regurgitated over and over ( in various forms) in books and films over the years.

I did like the character of John Pellam ( he is to be found in other 'Location Scout' books) but I prefered the character of the cop, Buffet. The parts of the book that centre around cop, Donnie Buffet are probably the better written and more interesting parts. And I did like the way Jeffery Deaver tricks us a few times in the telling of the story, that's something I wouldn't mind incorporating into my own work.

Average 7/10