News, text messages, errands, family, and friends. Honestly, life can feel overwhelming sometimes. Reading is my escape. My favorite recent book is 22 Seconds. It’s the latest installment in James Patterson’s #1 bestselling Women’s Murder Club (WMC) series. Patterson is one of my favorite writers, so it’s no surprise that it took just 22 seconds of reading for me to be 100 percent sold on it. Book Genre: Adult, Crime, Detective, Fiction, Mystery, Mystery Thriller, Suspense, Thriller, Unfinished However, the book’s plot shifts when a tip from Boxer’s informant leads her to a case that hits close to home. It includes professional hits, former cops—many of whom are Boxer’s good friends—and an ominous warning scrawled on the bodies of the case’s murder victims: You talk, you die. Boxer becomes deeply involved in the murders, risking both her badge and her life, and she’s forced to make impossible decisions with equally unpleasant outcomes. I was enthralled by the story from start to finish. (Trust me, you won’t be disappointed.) James Patterson breaks the rules—and so do his characters.

22 Seconds by James Patterson | Waterstones

A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy. Lindsay Boxer faces a ton of trouble in the latest entry in Patterson and Paetro’s Women’s Murder Club series. Patterson boils a scene down to a single, telling detail, the element that defines a character or moves a plot along. It's what fires off the movie projector in the reader's mind. MICHAEL CONNELLYSenior crime reporter Cindy Thomas is writing a biography of Evan Burke, a notorious serial killer who sits in solitary confinement in San Quentin. She’s kidnapped by thugs wanting her to talk about her best friend, Lindsay Boxer, who’s an SFPD homicide detective and the story’s main character. San Francisco has a restrictive new gun law, and gun-totin’ folks everywhere have their boxer shorts in a twist. A national resistance movement has formed—Defenders of the Second—whose motto is “We will not comply.” They find it outrageous that the new law makes it illegal to own a gun that can kill 50 people with a single clip. Meanwhile, lots of bodies show up: A young girl disappears and is later found dead in a ditch, and ex-cops are found dead with their lips stapled shut and “You talk, you die” written on their foreheads. An inmate is found hanged in prison. And “a massive but unspecified load of military-style weaponry was en route from Mexico to the City by the Bay.” In a “frustrating, multipronged case,” there’s a harrowing shootout memorialized in a video showing “twenty-two of the scariest seconds” of Boxer’s life. She’s an appealing series hero with loving family and friends, but she may arrive at a crossroads where she has “to choose between my work and [my] baby girl.” The formulaic story has unmemorable writing, but it’s entertaining and well told. You probably won’t have to worry about the main characters, who have thus far survived 21 adventures. Except for the little girl, you can expect people to get what they deserve. It's relatively mild as crime novels go, but the women characters are serious, strong, and admirable. Take Lindsay Boxer, the San Francisco Police Department Sergeant at the heart of 22 Seconds’ story, as an example. When she’s confronted with obstacles, she puts her nose down and plows through. She is resilient and has respect for her victims. She’s got her problems, sure. But she’s the kind of person you want in your corner (and the kind of person I’d like to think I would be—that is, if I spent my life chasing murderers).