While a bank is being robbed, the manager’s family is being held hostage. If they don’t get their money in a set amount of time, the family will be killed. They get their money, but within a minute the family is killed, anyway. Alex Cross is working with the FBI on this one. Then it happens again, but this time, bank employees are killed and the family is left alive. Someone called “The Mastermind” is behind it, with the help of others (who mostly don’t last long themselves).

This is a really good series. It is dark and violent, though. I am often not as interested in the sections/chapters (in most books) from the “bad guy’s” POV, but this one was good. Maybe the psychology of it made it more interesting to me? Parts of Alex’s personal life was interesting and other parts I wasn’t as concerned about; in any case, there was some forward movement on that part of his life, as well. And yup – the end was definitely a surprise! ( )

Roses are Red is a romantic thriller that features Detective Alex Cross. This time he is up against a criminal who calls himself the Mastermind. His first crime is a bank robbery with the bank employees families held hostage, if the employees do not follow instructions or the robbers are not out on time the hostages will be killed. Each crime is different, often involving different criminals, building to a million dollar hostage situation. This is much more than a thriller, Alex has a love interest or two, a wonderful family that you’ll love, personal problems, etc. Joy Stuart.

Why is it that everyone Alex Cross loves or trusts ends up screwing him in the end? I considered the guy who's the Mastermind as a villain in earlier books but that went by the wayside...guess he didn't. I fully expect one of Alex's kids to grow up to be a killer in one of the higher number editions of this series...that's just how it seems to go... ( )

Fluff but fun fluff. A page turner. Very visual-like NYPD Blue.

A terrific, humanized, police procedural that picks up soon after "Pop Goes the Weasel" leaves off. Christine is traumatized by her ordeal by the Weasel though her little boy with Alex is the apple of everyone's eye. Still, Alex is still a detective and works the streets and his personal life has to pay a price.

The premise is a series of bank robberies where sometimes hostages, sometimes bank employees, are shot. And the reader is in the mind of the robbers as well as The Mastermind, the evil human being who selects the robbers and plans the murders. There is a repetitive counting and exactness for the timing of each robbery that makes the psychological bent of the killers and the Mastermind the forefront of the episodes.

And then shortly after each robbery is a twist. And a woman is attacked by the Mastermind. And still some clues just don't lead to any results. It is one of those mysteries that did not take pity on anyone, hostage or bank robber alike, and just when things couldn't get worse, they do. Till the very end where a clue just leaps off the page and gets the reader ready for the next book! ( )