Book Review: Deception

Hey everyone!!

Being a senior and all that I have been hard pressed to find time to get books from the Library much less read them. However, when the feeling of stress did nothing but increase I knew I had to face the situation head-on with my "old-as-time, Mercy fix-all" i.e. reading a good book. (Usually when I am feeling OVERWHELMED I do one of two things: 1. pound on the piano for at least 20 mins if not an hour until I know I am not scowling anymore or 2. disappear into the enormous landscape of a most amazing novel)

So this time I decided to "make" myself sit down at the computer and put "Deception" (by Randy Alcorn), the book I have been waiting almost 4 years to read, on hold at the Library.

I proceeded to read it over a span of 4 days (on a big-Azure weekend that my sister came home) and I thought it would be cool to use this blog to write a book review.

I am going to start this highly questionable post with a disclaimer: This is the First book review I have ever attempted and so please do not judge too quickly or harshly.

After 4 years of edge-of-your-seat anticipation, you would think that the book would have a hard time meeting those highly placed expectations , but this book passed the test with flying colors!

As you open the pages you enter the world, life, and even the mind of one Detective Oliver Justice Chandler. With his dog Mulch and his trusty guns Ollie faces murder every day. As a homicide detective with the Portland police he is one of the 10 criminal-catching masterminds that that city keeps on their toes. This beer-drinking, double cheese, double pepperoni pizza loving crime-fighter is also fighting the notion that a good God would allow the evil that he sees every day into this world. Haunted by the death of his wife to cancer and his subsequent dysfunctional relationships with his daughters, he fights on to serve the victims, and their families, the justice only he can bring about. When the mysteries of an elaborate murder continue to close in on him, he still refuses to look to God yet cannot deny the things that Jake Woods and Clarence Abernathy continue to point out as God's fingerprints.

Deception has many qualities which I admire in a novel:
The story's telling itself was absolutely superb.
One minute you think you have the case all figured out and the killer has got to be nailed down on the next page... you just know it... but alas, the next page comes and not only is the person you had already convicted cleared another suspect is definitely the killer and then on the next page after that you are wondering how anyone in the story could be such a devious schemer.

The Character development was amazing.
Not just Ollie's journey as he works through thoughts about Christianity but also the development of the sub-characters even to the personality of his dog.

The shifting of moods was very good.
I remember at one point (about 2/3 rds through) crying through one page and laughing at the next. The measure of suspense was moderate throughout yet fluctuated enough to keep your heart beating different rates.

The Parallels drawn were incredibly thought out and eye-opening.

The showing of the influence parents have on the out comes of their children I think can be convicting for anyone.

The truth that "things are not always as they appear" and that "deceptions" lurk everywhere could not have been more clearly shown.


I liked how quotable it is (almost as much as a movie :)) and I loved the Sherlock Holmes quotes that started each chapter.

All in all it was a fantastic read that I would recommend to readers above the age of 15 or 16.