Reviews
Of all the crime writers currently mining Florida for fictional gold, James W. Hall is arguably the best at catching that state's unique topographic heartbeat. In his books about beach bum Thorne (including Buzz Cut, Mean High Tide, and Hard Aground), you can smell the ocean mixed in with the blood. Now Hall is starting a new series, about Miami police photographer Alexandra Rafferty, and readers will probably overlook the nagging feeling of some ingredients from other Florida writers tossed into the mix (Elmore Leonard's gallery of colorful sociopaths, Carl Hiaasen's over-the-top quirkiness) because of dead-on descriptions like this: "Jennifer McDougal's small white cottage at 2709 Leafy Way was wedged between two Coconut Grove mansions. To the west was a massive high-tech structure with severe angles, skylights, buttresses, heavy concrete archways, and dozens of columns holding up a grape trellis. A neon flamingo was lit up beside the massive front doors and neon numerals flickered beneath it." Alexandra is a fascinating character, wounded by a childhood rape. Very protective of her ex-policeman father who saved her then and has now slipped into senility, she deliberately keeps her talents and emotions in check. Her husband (one of those lovable Leonard lunatics) is an armored-car driver secretly planning the crime of the century, and the rest of the plot involves the search for a killer of young women who leaves his victims in unusual postures. --Dick Adler


From Publishers Weekly
Following last year's downcast Red Sky at Night, which left beachcomber-hero Thorn in a wheelchair, Hall bounces back with a new protagonist, Alexandra Rafferty, an appealing fourth-degree blackbelt, crime-scene photographer and all-around Miami PD femme Nikita. Shadowed by 18 years of guilt from the grisly aftermath of her rape at age 11, Alex is the loving caregiver to her father, an ex-cop befuddled by senility. Caught up in a series of serial killings of young women whose bodies are left in bizarre postures, Alex is unaware that her cretinoid husband, Stan, an armored car driver, is planning the perfect robbery. All hell breaks loose when a sexy pool-cleaner/ burglar (who keeps a pet cockroach in her pocket) chances on the scene and sees Stan's airhead mistress make off with two bags worth a cool million. When Alex's pixilated dad steals back the loot, most of the major elements of this whimsical action-packed plot are in place. The ensuing 600-mile chase takes Alex and dad to Seaside, the well-known planned community on the sugary beaches of the Florida panhandle. Forgiving the distracting, superfluous plot threads, Hall fans will be more than reimbursed by his poetic imagery in the landscapes and love scenes. Alex is a heroine with enough endearing attributes to sustain yet another long-running character series. $200,000 ad/promo; audio to Brilliance; author tour. Agent, Richard Pine; editor, Jenifer Weis. (Sept.) FYI: Seaside, Fla., was the location for the new Jim Carrey film, The Truman Show.Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Miami police photographer Alexandra Collins Rafferty has a few problems. Her marriage is falling apart, her father has Alzheimer's, she is attracted to one of her fellow karate students but is unsure about her feelings for him, and a rapist-murderer is terrorizing the city. Then Stan, her crime-obsessed husband, an armored-car driver, thinks he has pulled off the perfect robbery and plans to run off with his young mistress. But the theft is witnessed by a ruthless woman who, with her hulking partner, is determined to find the loot. A deadly chase to a Gulf Coast resort ensues. The serial killer plot seems peripheral until a shocking revelation near the end. Hall (Buzz Cut, Audio Reviews, LJ 8/96) tries to embellish the plot by having the characters engage in colorful dialog about all manner of subjects, but he is not in the same league as Elmore Leonard and Carl Hiaasen, despite reader Laural(OK) Merlington's best efforts to convey the humor. Recommended for public libraries.?Michael Adams, CUNY Graduate Ctr., New YorkCopyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.


The New York Times Book Review, Marilyn Stasio
Hall ... scores big with his villains, who have the delusional capacity of poets, philosophers and maniacs.


From AudioFile
James W. Hall has given Thorn, iconoclastic fisherman and hero of five of his previous novels, a breather and created a new character, Alexandra Rafferty, an offbeat Miami police photographer with a haunted past. BODY LANGUAGE is a more than passable effort, but it's not up to the standards Hall set in BUZZ CUT or RED SKY AT NIGHT. Laural Merlington is an excellent reader, but she shouldn't have been assigned this book. The protagonist is female, but most of the other characters aren't, and neither is the author's distinct and hard-boiled voice. M.D.B. © AudioFile 2002, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine


From Booklist
When Hall's first mystery, Under Cover of Daylight, appeared in 1987, the idea of Florida as a kind of neon Armageddon was the genre's hot new theme. Now, with Hall, Carl Hiaasen, and numerous others diligently working the soil, it's threatening to become a cliche . More than any of his Floridian peers, Hall has avoided repetition; his hermit-sleuth Thorn has appeared in most of his books, but the focus has jumped from environmental issues to struggles with personal demons. Changing gears even more dramatically, Hall now introduces a new series character, Miami forensic photographer Alexandra Rafferty, whose demons are both internal and external. Attempting to avoid a dark secret in her past (for once, it isn't incest), Rafferty loses herself in the distanced objectivity of photographing crime scenes ("Eyes neutral. No personality, no throb of self"). The throbbing begins, however, when Alex realizes that the serial killer called the Bleeder is positioning his victims' bodies to spell her name. Meanwhile, Alex's disaffected husband, a Brinks armored-car driver, attempts to combine chaos theory with crime in the hopes of becoming what he calls the "first post-Einstein robber." Alex lands in the middle of the resulting chaos, and with her Alzheimer's-suffering Dad in tow, discovers she can run but she can't hide. Hall effectively combines Ridley Pearson^-like suspense and forensic detail with a near-flawless grasp of character; his Florida loonies are as loony as Hiaasen's, but they go well beyond caricature: loonies with heart. Only a too-pat romantic subplot and a slightly too happy ending keep this thriller from perfection. Bill Ott


Review
"A first rate thriller by a masterful writer."--James Patterson

"Hall shows himself to be an ingenious plotter...In Alex he has created a character to care about."--People

"Body Language is James Hall showing off all his best stuff. Complex and edgy, engrossing and masterful. This book's a cut above the rest. It's his very best."--Michael Connelly



Review
"A first rate thriller by a masterful writer."--James Patterson

"Hall shows himself to be an ingenious plotter...In Alex he has created a character to care about."--People

"Body Language is James Hall showing off all his best stuff. Complex and edgy, engrossing and masterful. This book's a cut above the rest. It's his very best."--Michael Connelly



Review
"A first rate thriller by a masterful writer."--James Patterson

"Hall shows himself to be an ingenious plotter...In Alex he has created a character to care about."--People

"Body Language is James Hall showing off all his best stuff. Complex and edgy, engrossing and masterful. This book's a cut above the rest. It's his very best."--Michael Connelly



Book Description
Eighteen years ago, a girl shot down a rapist while her father's lawnmower sputtered in the yard outside. Somewhere in the heat and shadows of that day, Alexandra Rafferty took on the burden of her deed, and forged a bond of silence with her cop father. But now Alexandra's husband has left, her father is clinging to his health, and a Miami serial killer is leaving behind death scenes that go beyond the horrific. For Alexandra, her life and work are exploding--exposing the truth about the killer she seeks, the lover she's choosing, and one summer afternoon that has never gone away...



From the Publisher
"Body Language seduces you, then it grabs you, and it never lets you go. This is a first-rate thriller by a masterful writer." --James Patterson "Alexandra Rafferty is a fabulous addition to the ranks of law enforcement. She is smart, competent, the consummate professional, and her job as a Miami P.D. photographic specialist places her at the crime scene, with a cold eye for detail and a passionate commitment to justice." --Sue Grafton "Body Language is James Hall showing all his best stuff. Complex and edgy, engrossing and masterful. This book's a cut above the rest. It's his very best." --Michael Connelly "Hall shows himself to be an ingenious plotter.... In Alex he has created a character to care about." --People "A sizzling tale of sex, blood, and obsession. James Hall just gets better and better." --Stephen Coonts, bestselling author of Fortunes of War "[James w. Hall] scores big with his villains, who have the delusional capacity of poetry, philosophers and maniacs." --Marilyn Stasio, New York Times Book Review "Like top-drawer Dutch Leonard turned inside out...smart, observant, richly grotesque." --James Ellroy "Hall nails you to the page until the suspense-laden climax." --Clive Cussler "This Florida-based thriller gives mystery readers a new heroine--a methodical, nurturing and tenacious Alexandra Rafferty. She is one character with whom you will be pleased to become acquainted..." --The Oakland Press "A well-plotted mystery...Past hurts and current passions come into play in a riveting way that simply won't allow you to put the book down... We can only hope that...this won't be the last we see of Alexandra Rafferty." --The Tampa Tribune Times "A strangely exhilarating delicacy...It's almost a disappointment to get to the end of the book " --Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Eighteen years ago, a girl shot down a rapist while her father's lawnmower sputtered in the yard outside. Somewhere in the heat and shadows of that day, Alexandra Rafferty took on the burden of her deed, and forged a bond of silence with her cop father. But now Alexandra's husband has left, her father is clinging to his health, and a Miami serial killer is leaving behind death scenes that go beyond the horrific. For Alexandra, her life and work are exploding--exposing the truth about the killer she seeks, the lover she's choosing, and one summer afternoon that has never gone away...

FROM THE CRITICS

Michael Connell - USA Today

Body Language is James Hall showing all his best stuff. Complex and edgy, engrossing and masterful.

Publishers Weekly

Following last year's downcast Red Sky at Night, which left beachcomber-hero Thorn in a wheelchair, Hall bounces back with a new protagonist, Alexandra Rafferty, an appealing fourth-degree blackbelt, crime-scene photographer and all-around Miami PD femme Nikita. Shadowed by 18 years of guilt from the grisly aftermath of her rape at age 11, Alex is the loving caregiver to her father, an ex-cop befuddled by senility. Caught up in a series of serial killings of young women whose bodies are left in bizarre postures, Alex is unaware that her cretinoid husband, Stan, an armored car driver, is planning the perfect robbery. All hell breaks loose when a sexy pool-cleaner/ burglar (who keeps a pet cockroach in her pocket) chances on the scene and sees Stan's airhead mistress make off with two bags worth a cool million. When Alex's pixilated dad steals back the loot, most of the major elements of this whimsical action-packed plot are in place. The ensuing 600-mile chase takes Alex and dad to Seaside, the well-known planned community on the sugary beaches of the Florida panhandle. Forgiving the distracting, superfluous plot threads, Hall fans will be more than reimbursed by his poetic imagery in the landscapes and love scenes. Alex is a heroine with enough endearing attributes to sustain yet another long-running character series. $200,000 ad/promo; audio to Brilliance; author tour. Agent, Richard Pine; editor, Jenifer Weis. (Sept.) FYI: Seaside, Fla., was the location for the new Jim Carrey film, The Truman Show.

Chicago Tribune

The best.

BookList

More than any of his Floridian peers, Hall had avoided repetition.... Hall effectively combines Ridley Person-like suspense and forensic detail with a near-flawless grasp of character; his Floridian loonies are as loony as Hiaasen's, but they go well beyond caricature: loonies with heart.

New York Times Book Review

James Hall's prose runs as clean and fast as Gulf Stream waters.Read all 7 "From The Critics" >

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING

Hall nails you to the page until the suspense-laden climax. — Clive Cussler

Highly original and entertaining. — Elmore Leonard

...smart, observant, richly grotesque. — James Ellroy

Body Language seduces you, then grabs you, and it never lets you go. This is a first-rate by a masterful writer. -- Author of Kiss the Girls and Cat and Mouse — James Patterson

...astringent, penetrating, and unfailingly gripping... — Dean Koontz

Body Language is James Hall showing all his best stuff. Complex and edgy, engrossing and masterful. I've been reading and learning from Hall for a long time but this book's a cut above the rest. It's his very best. — Michael Connelly

Body Language is a sizzling tale of sex, blood, and obsession. James Hall just gets better and better. — Stephen Coonts

Alexandra Rafferty is a fabulous addition to the ranks of law enforcement. — Sue Grafton