First, if you haven’t read the first book in this series, Nash Falls, do not read this review as it contains major spoilers for that book. In fact, don’t even read the publisher’s blurb. Hope Rises is a direct sequel that continues Walter Nash’s story after the major cliffhanger in the first book.
The main plot point of Hope Rises is that Walter Nash has transformed himself from a rather nebbishy husband into a muscular undercover crime fighter. More remarkable is his transformation from a moral and upstanding everyman into an accomplice of an amoral killer of innocents. And then he starts feeling sympathetic toward the killer. Wow, that is a long, hard road for my mind to follow. And I just couldn’t do it. I spent the majority of the book fighting to suspend my disbelief.
David Baldacci has written some of my favorite twisty thrillers. But I’m done with this series. Read any of his other series first. Please. 2 very disappointed stars.
Thanks to NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for providing me with an advanced review copy.