Double Take - Hardcover

Mercer, Judy

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0671557076 ISBN 13: 9780671557072

Publisher: Atria, 1997

Synopsis

Struggling to regain her memory, Ariel Gold visits her grandfather on Kiawah Island, off the coast of South Carolina, where she discovers the deadly risks associated with remembering and is mistaken for her dead sister

About this title

About the Author

Judy Mercer is the author of four critically acclaimed thrillers featuring Ariel Gold -- Blind Spot, Fast Forward, Double Take and Split Image. She received a degree in broadcast journalism from the University of Georgia, and has worked as a news reporter, disc jockey, advertising copywriter, advertising director, and freelance writer. She lives in Marin County, California, with her husband.

Reviews

Mercer's second Ariel Gold thriller has a fetching cast and an ingenious plot device. True tension is the only missing element in this promising series. In Fast Forward (1995), Ariel Gold lost her memory in a Los Angeles explosion that coincidentally killed her twin sister Jane-- a sister Ariel didn't know she had. While coping with her amnesia, Ariel, who was raised separately from Jane by unloving adoptive parents, mysteriously became transformed into the person she might have been had she been raised in a good home. She lost 30 pounds, did better at her job as a producer for an investigative TV show called Open File, started using makeup, and became outgoing and confident. So changed did she become in fact that her thrice- divorced boss, Henry Heller, who had never given her a second glance, is now in love with her; and her new-found grandfather, a wealthy southerner, is showering her with attention. This second installment begins near his house on Kiawah Island in South Carolina, where Ariel meets John William Barron, an old friend of Jane's, who is discovered the following day dead of carbon-monoxide poisoning in what is supposedly a suicide. Because of John William's connection to her sister, Ariel investigates the mysterious circumstances of his death and the gothic goings-on of his scandal-ridden Charleston family (his father was also supposedly a suicide), while on the other coast Henry takes care of her dogs and conducts his own inquiries into the disappearance of a computer genius, the founder of MicroStar. The dual mysteries, solved in interweaving chapters, work against the build-up of suspense in either one, and an attempt to bring an L.A. villain to South Carolina never becomes integrated into the story. No page-turner, but Mercer nevertheless is a bright author with a fine sense of humanity and some ideas that may very well mature. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Readers who liked Fast Forward (1995) are the best audience for Mercer's latest, which picks up investigative journalist Ariel Gold's odd life somewhere in its melodramatic center. We get whispers about the recent death of a twin sister Ariel knew little about and references to a dysfunctional adoptive family and a devastating bout with amnesia. In the meantime, we're plunked down in the middle of a blossoming relationship with a grandfather Ariel has only recently met. Yet a knotty personal history aside, Ariel proves herself plucky enough to keep readers interested as she digs into the circumstances surrounding the apparent suicides of a father and son. A touch of romance and the lure of a second mystery help, too: Ariel's rumpled, workaholic boss (who seems to be smitten with Ariel) has his own puzzle to unravel. The writing isn't as sharp or the thrills as plentiful as they were in Fast Forward, but the plot still offers sufficient twists and turns to satisfy most mystery fans. Stephanie Zvirin

In her sequel to Fast Forward (LJ 4/1/95), Mercer sets in motion two plots of intrigue on opposite sides of the country. Ariel Gold, an amnesiac who discovers that she has a twin only after the twin is murdered, visits her deceased sister's guardian, B.F., in Kiawah, Georgia, where, at the same time, the suicide of native John William Barron casts new light on his famous painter father's suicide of years before. In California, Ariel's boss, Henry, uncovers disturbing facts about the disappearance of a successful businessman, while Ariel, snooping in Kiawah, gets caught up in both mysteries. Unfortunately, the reader cannot do the same. Replete with implausible character convolutions and a turbid layering of motives, the story lacks coherence and credibility. Not recommended.?Michelle Foyt, Fairfield P.L., Ct.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Atria
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0671557076
• ISBN 13: 9780671557072
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384