After reading Patterson's recent thriller, Private Games, I wasn't sure he would be able to top himself. He didn't quite achieve that feat here with 11th Hour, but he came pretty close. It's always plenty creepy to think about what could be happening right now on the streets of San Francisco, from severed heads being found on expensive property to a vengeful, well-trained killer hunting down drug dealers. It's just too bad Patterson doesn't add a courtroom storyline to the latest Women's Murder Club books, because that was always one of my favorite parts of the series.

I only drop this one down to four stars because of the subplot involving (view spoiler)[Lindsay's assumption that Joe, her fiance, cheated on her with some strange woman in DC. To be honest, I'm surprised Lindsay couldn't just let Joe have a chance to explain himself, and that it took a false-alarm possibility of early labor to bring the two back together. (hide spoiler)] Really, that was just too much.

But even if you demand perfection from your books, at least try this out for the preview at the end, for Patterson's upcoming novel Zoo. From the looks of it, Patterson is entering into Crichton territory with that one. Why do we have to wait till September for it?!?