Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: The Tutor by Peter Abrahams, James Daniels, Jill Sovis ISBN: 1590861965 Publisher: Brilliance Audio Pub. Date: June, 2002 Format: Audio Cassette Volumes: 7 List Price(USD): $32.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.62
Rating: 4
Summary: Only slightly sinister
Comment: Linda and Scott Gardner have hired an instructer from a tutoring service, Julian Sawyer, to privately tutor their son, Brandon, and help him improve his SAT scores. Brandon is all set to dislike Julian right from the get-go but never gets the chance. Hey, this guy is cool! Linda and Scott fall for the tutor's charm next, relying on him for car rides, business and financial advice, and tennis tips. Brandon's little sister, Ruby, age eleven, an outgoing little Sherlock fan, shares Brandon's feelings as well. But she's also brighter than her brother (or parents) and soon deduces that Julian is not everything he appears. While the rest of her family is cuddled in Julian's palm like a sparrow in the hand of the neighborhood bully, Ruby is sniffing along for clues in a manner even Sherlock Holmes couldn't knock.
THE TUTOR starts out strong. The pace is fast, the details interesting, the characters memorable. The middle isn't so bad either. But the ending bombs inexcusably -- perhaps because as the story progresses it becomes more and more out of this world. Peter Abrahams has created here a portfolio of surreal characters, more caricatures than flesh and blood people. Each one represents a certain weakness which Julian exploits to the hilt, although Julian himself has weaknesses, as every good villain must. There's a blurb on this book's jacket from Stephen King praising the author, and while Abrahams's style may briefly remind you of King's in the way it comes across as not quite on the level, Abrahams doesn't hold a candle to King's way with words. THE TUTOR is reasonably well written and contains some excellent descriptions, but most books are reasonably well written. Little here stands out.
Horror fans, be warned. You may not be horrified (unless snakes deeply upset you). But THE TUTOR is a stylishly crafted if skewed nailbiter tale, and as such should have a case with suspense fans.
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent Thriller! Abrahams does it again!!
Comment: Peter Abrahams must be a scary,scary man. "Crying Wolf" was a brilliant, intense suspense thriller in a class of its own. Now he's given us "The Tutor", outdoing himself by far, notching up the intensity to the n-th degree, creating a page-turner to beat all page-turners!
The Gardners are a typical upper middle class family, striving to be better. Husband and father Scott Gardner is jealous of his brother, who seems to have everything Scott doesn't. Scott pushes his family to excel and succeed...but is hampered by the memory of his dead son, Adam. Brandon Gardner, Scott's next-oldest son and still living, must survive with the pressure of Adam's ghost hovering over his world all the time. Scott is certain that Adam would've grown up to become the perfect uber-son, had he not succumbed to leukemia at a relatively young age. And now Brandon is beginning to show signs of failure.
Enter Julian Sawyer, an opportunistic man hired as tutor to Brandon Gardner. Think Norman Bates here. The tutor is a skillful sociopath with evil intent on his mind.
Throw into the mix a precocious young daughter who idolizes Sherlock Holmes, and you have a brilliant thriller that makes ones pulse pound to the very end.
Abrahams has written an intelligent, wonderful novel in "The Tutor". Well-portrayed characters, and a believable plot make this a must-read book!
Rating: 4
Summary: The Tutor
Comment: I think I shall rave about this book for a little while--at least long enough to assuage the guilt over not simply giving it a five-star nod. I mean, how do you actually rate a novel that is a traditional thriller, but dares to remain understated, dares to avoid glitz, most of the way through? Ultimately, I think the author could have worked in a few more scenes of real mayhem and yet not degenerated to shlock, but since he didn't--since The Tutor is restrained, creeping terror without splatter til the late-going--I'm left trying to say it like this: for restrained, creeping terror in a domestic setting, I award the full five starrinos, but for not finding a way to work in a bit more splatter, I deduct one star, leaving a sort of phantom or ghost star.
Which means it's still well worth reading. Fans of Ramsey Campbell's Nazareth Hill should stop here, to meet another plucky adolescent girl who may be the only one clever enough to notice danger as it slowly infects her home (of course any brave child remotely resembling the heroine in Nazareth Hill, and finding herself in similar--but not supernatural--dire straits, is likely to win me over big-time). Fans of Stephen King's Misery should probably meet The Tutor; Peter Abrahams seems to have King's ability to create characters and situations presented in a style that compels you to read on and on and on until the book is suddenly finished (and they both do psychopaths very well, thank you). Fans of...well, heck, either Conan Doyle's "The Speckled Band", or Alan Scholefield's forgotten novel Venom (also a forgotten film!), should read The Tutor, if snakes don't actually make you shiver too much, that is. And most of all, fans of something like A Judgement In Stone, by Ruth Rendell, should read this, because Rendell had already proved that you don't need violence in every chapter of a thriller to generate palpable chills.
Iago fans are also invited, to come appreciate Abraham's terrible, tutoring, two-faced villain. Columbo fans...hey, drop in also, to watch eleven-year-old Ruby start to collect the clues that say her family has invited evil into their home. Now that I've invited everyone, I'll stop. But read this book, thriller fans!
XML error: at line 0