Fans of James Patterson's resourceful cop Alex Cross will be relievedto find that he's back on familiar territory with Violets Are Blue--and,more importantly, that this is one of the best Alex Cross thrillers yet.The malign criminal genius of Roses Are Red is fixing to giveAlex a hard time once again. The FBI joins Patterson's dogged cop in aparticularly unsettling investigation: two San Francisco joggers have beenviciously murdered and are found suspended by their feet, with all the blooddrained from their corpses. And when further brutal deaths follow in Californiaand on the East Coast, Alex is forced to contemplate the bizarre possibility ofmodern-day vampires, although his instincts point him to one of the manysinister religious cults that flourish on the West Coast. Aided by JamillaHughes, a streetwise young woman detective from San Francisco, Alex finds thathe has to crack not one but two impenetrable mysteries to stop furtherbloodletting.Patterson fans expect the extremely concise, page-turning chapters (116 of themhere!), along with a reluctance to dawdle over details of his hero's personallife, and both characteristics are firmly back in place. If you can resistreading this one in just a few sittings, you deserve some kind of a thrillerreader's medal. --Barry Forshaw, Amazon.co.uk