Predictable and slow. ( )

Fino alla metà del libro non succede nulla e non c'è nulla di interessante. Poi si movimenta e alla fine diventa un bel libro con una storia originale. In teoria doveva essere un thriller ma non basta un omicidio e un cadavere per poter entrare nella categoria. ( )

LibraryThing Early Reviewer:
This was a hard-to-put-down book about four Dartmouth College students named Kristina, Albert, Jim and Conni who were very close friends. When Kristina is found frozen in the snow after nine days, it sparks a murder investigation filled with secrets, lies and betrayal. This book is a haunting and intriguing story of friends who knew Kristina was missing but were filled with denial, cowardice, and chilling indifference. Detective Spencer O'Malley is bound and determined to find out how these close friends can react this way to Kristina's murder. With many twists and turns, the reader is on a roller coaster ride as O'Malley gets the answers to many riveting questions.
This book was first published in 1996 and will be republished in 2017. I found this book to be very intense with dark overtones but the suspense kept the pages turning. I look forward to reading more from this author and highly recommend this book to those who love mystery thrillers with lots of shocking secrets. ( )

I was intrigued by the description of Red Leaves by Paullina Simons...

"In the tradition of Ira Levin’s A Kiss Before Dying and Donna Tartt’s The Secret History comes a suspenseful thriller from the international bestselling author of The Bronze Horseman—an utterly captivating story about four Ivy League students whose bizarre friendship leads to a twisted maze of secrets, lies, betrayal, and murder."

Sounds good right? Kristina is a star basketball player for Dartmouth. We meet her and her four friends playing a pick up game. There's an odd dynamic between the four from the opening chapters - not what you would expect of friends. Kristina leaves as the game is over to make an appointment with a Howard. Again, a very odd dynamic and a reveal. (I'm not going to spoil it in case you plan to read this book.) More oddness - Kristina happens to catch the eye of a police detective as she flounces around without a coat in the cold. (Much is made of her going without warm clothing throughout the book.) The cop's behaviour is not believable at all. Or is Kristina's or anyone else's for that matter.

So, part one is a (repetitive) rehash of the relationship between the four, both past and present that seems to go on and on. I grew tired of the enigmatic, evasive and mysterious circumstances of their friendships, the philosophical wordplay and bantering. (Stop here if you are going to read Red Leaves - spoiler ahead. I can't help it) Part two finds Kristina dead. And guess who's in charge. Yes, that detective. His police work is slipshod and so far removed from actual police procedure that it's laughable. (More spoiling....at one point he has about a dozen Saturday night specials (guns) in his trunk that he hasn't turned in yet from a bust two or three weeks ago.)

Okay, so the murder is (poorly) investigated. But along with that, every character cannot remember or later (two years in one case) admits they lied. This felt like a very convenient plot device much of the time. And the book continued on long after it should have ended. (The whodunit is not surprising)

I found the writing choppy, stilted and clumsy. That comparison made to Secret History the publisher made? Nope, not even close.

What I subsequently discovered was that Red Leaves was originally published in 1996. I'm sure that Simons' work has become more polished as she has since written thirteen more bookS since Red Leaves and garnered much praise. Sorry to say, but this book was a (big) miss for me. ( )

I really had a difficult time getting through this book. The reason I chose it was that it was compared to Donna Tartt’s “The Secret History”. There is no comparison other than the fact that the book involves a group of college friends. There were several times when I wished I could just DNR this book but since I received a free copy from the publisher, I felt obligated to read the whole book in order to review it. Apparently, this book was published by St. Martin’s in 1996 but has been out of print for many years and now William Morrow is re-publishing five of the author’s books over the next three years. The author has received awards for her work so maybe it’s just me.

This story involves a young woman, Kristina Kim, and her very convoluted relationships with Connie, Jim and Albert. You know from the media’s blurbs that Kristina is going to be murdered. She’s the narrator in the first section of the book, which consists mostly of repetitive conversations between the four “friends” about this one loves that one and that one loves this one and that one is cheating and that one wants the relationship to end, over and over and over again. At one point, Kristina meets a policeman, Spencer O’Malley, with whom she has a flirtation. It’s O’Malley who is assigned her murder investigation and he’s determined to find her killer.

There were so many times throughout this book when I thought “What??” Conversations were consistently a bit off, contradictory, stilted and unrealistic. Events just didn’t fit together for me. I didn’t find the end big reveal that shocking. I did enjoy a few small sections of the book but then it would fall apart for me again. I feel the story wasn’t a bad one but it was very poorly written. My apologies to the publisher and author but truly, this book isn’t on par with “The Secret History” and shouldn’t be compared to it as it’s misleading.

This book was given to me by the publisher through Edelweiss in return for an honest review. ( )