Bill Eisner escaped the high-powered world of dog eat dog and opened a neighborhood coffee shop. His high-maintenance girlfriend stayed behind. Now all he wants is a second chance in life, a chance to do something he enjoys and meet someone who can love him for who he is, not what he can buy her. The community loves him, the press loves him, and even the homeless think he’s one of the nicest guys … guys around.
Finally, he thinks he’s found true happiness with the woman of his dreams. Until she’s murdered. At her funeral, Bill discovers that the woman he loved had a lot of secrets and told him a lot of lies. But does it matter? She’s gone forever. Or is she? Her text messages say otherwise.
The police don’t believe Eisner and suspect he might be responsible for his girlfriend’s death. Meanwhile the text messages become more and more threatening. When a car bomb blows up his car he is forced to accept that someone or something clearly wants to kill him.
Hello Again combines the spine-tingling tension of a paranormal mystery and the descent into madness of a psychological thriller.
more
HELLO AGAIN has a colorful cast of characters all centered around Bill Eisner, a likeable guy who gave up practicing law to open a community oriented coffee shop. As new players are introduced, each seems to bring his or her own plotline along to muddy the directional waters. This makes for a pretty wild ride down various possible avenues.
Stan Schatt has managed to produce a fast paced book that will keep readers on their toes while they are turning pages. Is this a cyber tale? A paranormal mystery? Or, a crime thriller? Since I don’t do spoilers, all I will say is maybe. I will say that it has something for everybody.
I totally enjoyed reading HELLO AGAIN because of the characters. Each one has his or her own story and contributes to the overall confusion as the various threads start to mingle. In the end, no anecdote was extraneous, and everything fits in the end. Life is messy, but somehow in books and in life things mostly turn out OK.
3.5 Cranky Stars
This was a very straight forward tale. It wasn’t particularly too scary or overly sexualized. It was a great mix of mystery, paranormal, and intrigue. A classic “who done it?” with a supernatural twist.
I really like the descriptive way the author describes the location and setting. I got a local feeling for the San Diego area. I was able to visualize the setting which always makes for a better reading experience. I do wish that the female protagonist, Amber Love, would have been more developed.
I think she wasn’t in the book enough as an alive person. I really feel like if we had gotten to know her better as a character, then I would have become more emotionally connected to her, which would have made the story deeper and scarier in a good way. I want to mourn her loss, but she wasn’t around long enough for me to do that.
It was ok I just wish it had been scarier and juicier.
So this is one instance where the actual premise outshone the book’s execution: which in itself was really quite a shame as on paper this sounded fabulous.
There was actually nothing wrong with the writing here but for me, I found that the characters reactions to certain situations here just didn’t feel authentic to the storyline and I also failed to achieve any deeper emotional connection with any of the cast involved.
It all just felt so shallow and superficial if I’m being honest and as for Amber and Bills relationship well I just wasn’t feeling it during and definitely not after and Bill himself really didn’t seem that cut up at all about Ambers accident.
He just went on with his mundane life as normal with no outward portrayal of grief or loss.
I guess what I’m trying to impart here is Bill certainly didn’t act like a man who had lost the potential love of his life.
Most of this is told from Bills POV and I did think he came across as a trifle shallow at times.
Amber well I didn’t feel I got to know her beyond the superficial and I really felt that Bill was mostly wowed by her outward appearance rather than any deeper meaningful connection.
Also, what’s with the creepy stalking and investigating her? Talk about an invasion of privacy.
This also had every what not to do cliche you’d find in a B Horror movie.
And lastly that insensitive police officer: I was in shock when they were informing Ambers mum about her daughter’s death.
“Hello again” I’m sorry to say didn’t really work for me: the story itself was imaginative it just failed to live up to its original potential.
I voluntary reviewed a copy of Hello Again.
All opinions expressed are entirely my own.
Reviewed By Beckie Bookworm
https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/9460945-bex-beckie-bookworm
https://www.facebook.com/beckiebookworm/
http://www.beckiebookworm.com