2025 Book Review #28:The House of Cross

 

This is book #32 in the Alex Cross, Detective series by one of the most published contemporary authors in the world. 

Yes, I have read every single Alex Cross book, in order beginning with Along Came a Spider c. 1993.  

STORY SUMMARY

The president-elect, a female, is in Washington, D.C. planning her inauguration which is just a few weeks away.   

The list of Supreme Court candidates is, of course, highly confidential.  But....it soon becomes a piece of evidence when Detective Alex Cross, a former FBI profiler, must use it in his toughest investigation yet. 

One  candidate has been gunned down. Another one is stabbed, and a third one is murdered in cold blood close to midnight on a city street. 

Since Alex is the FBI's top expert in criminal behavior, he is being assigned to help solve these crimes. And for the sake of his family, city and nation, he must put himself in a most dangerous spot there is:  inside the mind of a diabolical killer who is also extremely smart. In other words: a sociopath. The sociopath is one of twins.  But which twin is he??

MY THOUGHTS

Well, I personally felt like this was the best Cross novel in the last 4 novels.  It moves very quickly through the plot and sub-plot.  Bree, Alex's wife comes back to play a role as does Sampson, his former partner, and Sampson's new love interest, a woman named Rebecca.  Of course we see Nana Mama, well into her 90's as well as each of Alex's children (Damon, Jannie (now also in college like Damon) and Ali, now in high school.  We also see more of Willow, John's young daughter whose mom died a few years ago. John has been missing his former wife and yet has finally found joy again in the arms of Rebecca. 

I love that the author keeps the families in the background in each novel as it's been interesting to see their characters develop over the last 30 years. What bugs me though is that Nana Mama is still alive. It seems she has been "in her nineties" for the last 20 years! 

I was  thrilled to see M/Maestro make a reappearance. This character has been in past books and is at the heart of these latest crimes. We learn more about his background and that of his twin brother, but I wish the author had developed that background a little further. (Childhood abuse, dysfunctional family life, adoption).  

I also love that there is a combination of personal life as well as the political side to the story.  I found this to be well done. 

There was a lot of gun violence in this book  and some of it seemed a tad bit far fetched. Especially considering the setting of British Columbia in sub zero temps and over 2 feet of snow.  But it did make for an exciting and fast moving plot. 

I don't want to give too much detail as it would ruin the story for you. 

Let's just say, things were wrapped up rather quickly and almost too perfect.  Until the ending when you find something out......and....will this be the end of M or not?? 

I also felt like maybe the author is setting us, the reader, up to say "good bye" to Nana Mama  finally.  We shall see when the next Alex Cross book comes out. 

One thing I noticed in this latest book:  there was hardly any crass language unlike past books and the story of Jesus' birth was included right from the Bible. Perhaps the author has become a Christian?? 

I found no editing errors in this book.

In my opinion, this book is appropriate for ages 17 and older (due to some mature content).

On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest, I rate this a 9.