From Library Journal
"Casanova" works the East Coast, "The Gentleman Caller" works the West Coast, and these two serial killers might just be working together. Washed-up Washington, D.C., police detective Alex Cross gets involved when his niece is abducted. Since this is a new work by the author of the best-selling Along Came a Spider (LJ 12/92), don't be surprised that Paramount has bought the film rights and that BOMC has made it a main selection.Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From AudioFile
What's worse than a serial killer on the loose? How about twin serial killers? While Casanova and The Gentleman Caller are not blood brothers, psychologist/detective Alex Cross explains twinning to show how they work together to pull off their grisly crimes. When Cross's niece becomes the latest victim, he uses his research on twinning to catch the killers. This three-hour abridgment is riveting. Macabre sound effects, careful editing and chilling performances by Guillaume and Noth produce a viseral reaction in the listener. Though complicated and fast-paced, the story is easy to follow and hard to forget. In three years of reviewing, this is the first time this reviewer has assigned Earphones to abridged fiction. D.W.K. An AUDIOFILE Earphones Award winner (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine


From Kirkus Reviews
Advertising executive Patterson doubles neither our pleasure nor our fun by giving us two intense, Hannibal Lecter-type murderers for the price of one in an improbable and hopelessly derivative mess of a thriller. Feds and local authorities on both coasts are baffled by a pair of serial killers targeting beautiful young women: The Gentleman Caller works the scene in sunny L.A., where he brutally murders and dismembers his prey; his counterpart back East, who calls himself Casanova, trolls the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill area for sexy coeds to victimize. Their MOs provide plenty of fodder for an author trying to cook up a work of psychological terror: Both are powerful, handsome, brilliant (natch), commit perfect crimes, and, despite their busy schedules, manage to keep in touch with each other. To catch them, you obviously need a perfect crime fighter. Enter Alex Cross, the Washington, D.C., detective/psychologist hero of bestselling Along Came A Spider (1993), who gets dragged into all this after his niece Naomi, a student at Duke University, vanishes. Working with the authorities and a medical student named Kate McTiernan, who was lucky enough to escape Casanova's clutches, Cross begins to understand how the two dueling psychos operate. Just in the nick of time, too, because the Gentleman Caller, on the run from the law out West, decides that nothing could be finer than to be in Carolina with his old buddy Casanova. So, what does Cross, whose favorite niece is now in the clutches of two sickos, do? Fall in love with Kate McTiernan, of course, in an ill-placed romantic subplot intended to raise the stakes in the deadly cat-and-mouse game. Does Cross save Naomi? Are the two killers brought to justice or, at the very least, consigned to gory demises? Who cares? As a storyteller, Patterson is a great ad copywriter. (First priting of 275,000; film rights to Paramount; Book-of-the-Month Club main selection) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.


Download Description
"We begin with Alex Cross, the detective introduced in ALONG CAME A SPIDER. He's back, and this time it's personal. Alex's favorite niece, Naomi, a beautiful young woman, disappears from school at Duke University. The trail of evidence points to Wylie, a serial killer who takes sexual perversion to new heights. Wylie works in the Chapel Hill and Durham area of the South; his partner in depravity, Rudolph, finds his women in and around southern California. They are both serial freaks who have learned that there's strength in numbers. KISS THE GIRLS is about a secret sexual obsession of many men, and the nightmare of every woman in America. It is about a killer who takes women off the streets, who possesses them, subjugates them, keeps them captive, and murders many of them for ""disobedience."" Alex Cross encounters in the new South the most horrifying serial criminal in history. Eventually, it is believed that hundreds of women disappeared over a ten-year period. KISS THE GIRLS -- it's a roller-coaster, so hang on!"

FROM OUR EDITORS

When his niece is abducted, detective Alex Cross is drawn into a web of coast-to-coast terror involving two chillingly clever killers: one who targets Southern college coeds, the other who is terrorizing Los Angeles with a series of unspeakable murders.

ANNOTATION

In Los Angeles, a reporter investigating a series of murders is killed. In Chapel Hill, North Carolina, a beautiful medical intern suddenly disappears. Washington D.C.'s Alex Cross is back to solve the most baffling and terrifying murder case ever. Two clever pattern killers are collaborating, cooperating, competing--and they are working coast to coast.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

This time it's personal for Cross. The most elusive of killers has abducted Cross's niece, Naomi, a talented law student. Only such a devastating blow could bring the detective back - this time to the Deep South, where old slave prisons are buried in the forests, and houses of horror can disappear as in your worst nightmare. Naomi's kidnapping rips Alex Cross away from his kids and his jazz piano and sends him south with several questions burning in his mind. Why did the police wait seventy-two hours before beginning their search? And what is the head of the FBI doing at the scene of a small-town crime? Meanwhile, somewhere out there Casanova is living a secret fantasy. In his private hideaway, the world's greatest lover has assembled seven of the South's most extraordinary young women for his personal use. It's an accomplishment he can share with only one other soulmate - and that's definitely not his wife back in suburbia. But Casanova doesn't count on the exceptional abilities of one of his harem - or having Alex Cross as a nemesis.

SYNOPSIS

We begin with Alex Cross, the detective introduced in ALONG CAME A SPIDER. He's back, and this time it's personal. Alex's favorite niece, Naomi, a beautiful young woman, disappears from school at Duke University. The trail of evidence points to Wylie, a serial killer who takes sexual perversion to new heights.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal

"Casanova" works the East Coast, "The Gentleman Caller" works the West Coast, and these two serial killers might just be working together. Washed-up Washington, D.C., police detective Alex Cross gets involved when his niece is abducted. Since this is a new work by the author of the best-selling Along Came a Spider.

Library Journal

"Casanova" works the East Coast, "The Gentleman Caller" works the West Coast, and these two serial killers might just be working together. Washed-up Washington, D.C., police detective Alex Cross gets involved when his niece is abducted. Since this is a new work by the author of the best-selling Along Came a Spider.

AudioFile - Jeffery L. Rezin

Allow for plenty of uninterrupted time before beginning this frightening audio adventure. Once started, it's impossible to stop. Two of the best combine their delivery skills to heighten the impact. George Guidall breaths chilling life into the perverted serial murderers of beautiful, young women. Richard Ferrone performs the voice of detective Alex Cross in a deep baritone. Audio presentations now have a new level of excellence to target. J.L.R. An AUDIOFILE Earphones Award winner. cAudioFile, Portland, Maine

AudioFile - Diane W. Kazlauskas