November 14, 2004 in Features

James Patterson’s ‘London Bridges’ suffers from thin plot

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In James Patterson’s novel “London Bridges,” longtime hero Dr. Alex Cross remarks: “I felt as if I were in an Alfred Hitchcock movie.”

That comparison is perhaps too lofty. Patterson’s novel would be better likened to a big-budget action film.

This is his 10th book featuring Cross, the clever detective from best-selling novels-turned-films “Kiss the Girls” and “Along Came a Spider.” And “London Bridges” would be well suited for the big screen as well: It has a thin plot, many large explosions, stereotypical villains, gratuitous sex and a sensitive, yet tough and tortured leading man.

“London Bridges” begins when a Midwestern town is bombed off the map. The mastermind is a ruthless killer known as the Wolf. Cross, a forensic psychologist who is now an FBI agent, is dragged into the case and must battle his nemesis, the Weasel, who has teamed up with the more maniacal Wolf.

The Wolf plans mass murder and destruction in major cities around the globe, including New York, Paris and Tel Aviv, unless he is given several billion dollars and imprisoned terrorists are released. It is unclear how he has the funding and manpower to do such a thing, and Patterson never fully unravels this. The Wolf is part of the Russian mafia, but his reasons for an alignment with Mideast terrorists are also unclear.

Patterson fails to fully develop any of his characters, thus making them seem more like video game villains than fleshy, three-dimensional threats. The reader knows the Wolf is evil only because he kills his friends and blows up people, not because of any sleek writing by Patterson. Cross has family troubles, but they are never really developed. Instead, Patterson introduces myriad secondary characters that do not contribute to the thrust of the story.

As Cross hops from state to state and country to country, Patterson’s descriptions of the fellow investigators are staggeringly stereotypical. In Paris, for example, the French officers assigned to help him are rude and lazy: “The process was slow and the Frenchman needed frequent breaks for cigarettes and coffee.”

There is satisfaction in the novel’s outcome, and the cliffhangers throughout. Overall, though, “London Bridges” reads as though Patterson were trying to overcompensate for a higher threshold of fear because of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. As a result, many of the events seem excessive, especially when one considers real-life threats from terrorists.

Patterson has crafted an interesting character in Cross, but he would benefit from watching some of Hitchcock’s movies. Subtle, simple plots done with elegance are often the most terrifying tales.

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