All or Nothing

Rating:
Summary: All or Northing
Review: Having read Now or Never and Sooner or Later, I was quite disappointed with this latest effort. The plot was entertaining enough but there was no real character depth and not a great deal of excitement.

Rating:
Summary: All Or Nothing
Review: Having read the early works of Elixzabeth Adler, I am extremely disappointed in the genre she is now espousing. Where is the story, character delineation aand plot? She is now focusing on lack of vocabulary, except for four letter words, and explicit sexual scenes, neither of which further the plot. How I hope she returns to writing more novels like "Fortune is a Woman" and "Property of a Lady" If not, my friends and I will delete her from our list. She had such talent- let her show that talent again.

Rating:
Summary: Passionate thriller
Review: I enjoyed my first Adler because I liked her effervescent characters, even though they are too perfectly gorgeous. The heroes are breezy, flip, active, and passionately self-absorbed characters. They are presented as if nothing else existed in their lives: no legal class prep, no other clients; how nice. They like eating out, and we get their menus, as well as learning of their ever-changing clothing (or lack). The Baedecker's worth of restaurants seems worth visiting, but as a non-Angeleño I can't verify they're real. The cross-country sleuthing is clever, if expensive for a P.I. with no visible income.

Adler is a good writer, with clever turns of phrase and capable descriptions. Is there any significance that she seems to have a dynamic Jewish P.I. duo pursuing a satanic, fallen Baptist killer? Adler has the tough lingo and soft manly man attitude to a T. She likes to write, and writes with a gusto that carrried me right along. I may read more of Adler, especially since other reviewers say her other books are better than this fluff.

Rating:
Summary: Don't judge the author by this book.
Review: I have been a fan of Elizabeth Adler's, so I was eagerly awaiting her latest. In her previous books, her character developments were so superb, you hated to see the books end. Not so in this case. I became tired of the constant descriptions of Marla's wardrobe and found it hard to believe that she was a college professor. The plot was unbelievable. A third of the way through, the ending was easily predicted. Short on suspense, long on fluff!

Rating:
Summary: Great read!
Review: I loved this book. It was the first book I read by this author & I enjoyed it very much. I thought it had a lot of suspense.

Rating:
Summary: A cute story
Review: This is a very easy book to read, if you can read it in an airplane you will enjoy your flight and your book, the story of a private investigator and his girlfriend solving a very peculiar case (her first case) is really cute.

Rating:
Summary: Entertaining, but not spectacular
Review: This was my first Elizabeth Adler book. It started off good, and it did have several worthy twists that were different and refreshing, but...

There were too many times the POV switched within the narrative. First we're in Giraud's head and in the next sentence we're in Marla's. At least this was consistent, but disturbing. Sometimes there was a chapter or scene break to let us know we're in someone else's head, but that was the exception rather than the rule.

I also found Marla a bit too conveniently motherly to the poor accused man's wife at times. She seemed like a sex pot one time and then she suddenly had all of these maternal instincts pouring out. Didn't jibe with me.

Overall, however, it was not a bad read. I didn't put it down or want to stop and it was easy to get through. And I did like Marla and Giraud's playfulness. They would be a good duo for a sequel.

Rating:
Summary: Very entertaining
Review: This was the first book of Ms. Adler's which I've read. The good news is that her writing skills are excellent and that she paces the story beautifully, so that the reader gallops along with her premise. The details she provides are thorough and fascinating.

I have spent considerable time in L.A., where this novel is set, and I never had heard of most of the restaurants she writes about; they may be known to a resident such as Ms. Adler, but they are not in the guide books. So, on my next trip back to L.A., I do hope to try a few of the places she takes her characters.

The problem, of course, is that this is a mystery, and not a tourist guide. Though the read was fast and easy, after the ending is reached, it is inescapable that even as fiction, the plot is too filled with holes.

The heroine is a gorgeous, sexy, young, magnificently dressed, sexy (that's right, that's twice)... law professor? Oh, please. There aren't too many law professors who are only 32 years old, and those that are that young rarely are sexy. This small group of wonderkids have been much too fixated on their careers to have been worrying about their hair. Even assuming "arguendo," as the legal eagles say, that she is 32, gorgeous, sexy and magnificently dressed, I doubt that a Pepperdine University professor would fly to San Francisco to give a guest lecture at Berkeley, or meet with the L.A. district attorney to discuss the abilities of one of her students that the D.A. is considering hiring, or give a pop quiz to her class. A pop quiz? For law students, that's a new one. And when would this lusty little creature find the time to grade it? Between orgasms? None of this makes any sense.

Yet all of these objections don't even get to the underlying premise of the psychopathic homicidal maniac. Fiction should move readers along, not make them stop and snicker. Ms. Adler displays too much skill as an author to pander to the market for sex-and-violence as she does in ALL OR NOTHING.

Rating:
Summary: The Details Make the Story
Review: This was the first book of Ms. Adler's which I've read. The good news is that her writing skills are excellent and that she paces the story beautifully, so that the reader gallops along with her premise. The details she provides are thorough and fascinating.

I have spent considerable time in L.A., where this novel is set, and I never had heard of most of the restaurants she writes about; they may be known to a resident such as Ms. Adler, but they are not in the guide books. So, on my next trip back to L.A., I do hope to try a few of the places she takes her characters.

The problem, of course, is that this is a mystery, and not a tourist guide. Though the read was fast and easy, after the ending is reached, it is inescapable that even as fiction, the plot is too filled with holes.

The heroine is a gorgeous, sexy, young, magnificently dressed, sexy (that's right, that's twice)... law professor? Oh, please. There aren't too many law professors who are only 32 years old, and those that are that young rarely are sexy. This small group of wonderkids have been much too fixated on their careers to have been worrying about their hair. Even assuming "arguendo," as the legal eagles say, that she is 32, gorgeous, sexy and magnificently dressed, I doubt that a Pepperdine University professor would fly to San Francisco to give a guest lecture at Berkeley, or meet with the L.A. district attorney to discuss the abilities of one of her students that the D.A. is considering hiring, or give a pop quiz to her class. A pop quiz? For law students, that's a new one. And when would this lusty little creature find the time to grade it? Between orgasms? None of this makes any sense.

Yet all of these objections don't even get to the underlying premise of the psychopathic homicidal maniac. Fiction should move readers along, not make them stop and snicker. Ms. Adler displays too much skill as an author to pander to the market for sex-and-violence as she does in ALL OR NOTHING.