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Triptych | 
| Author: Karin Slaughter
Publisher: Arrow Books Ltd
Category: Book
Buy Used: $1.47
New (6) Used (33) from $1.47
Avg. Customer Rating:  60 reviews
Sales Rank: 522222
Format: Import
Media: Paperback
Edition: New Ed
Pages: 560
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 6.9 x 4.3 x 1.5
ISBN: 0099481839
EAN: 9780099481836
ASIN: 0099481839
Publication Date: 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: **UK SHIPPED** With friendly customer service! Sent by air mail, usually takes 10-15 days "Buy with confidence, Buy Book EcoLOGICal" Spine has reading bend.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 55 more reviews...
A serial killer thriller from bestseller Karin Slaugther October 2, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Tryptych is the strangly named title of Karin Slaughter's riveting thriller. This is the first book I've read by the author and won't be the last. There are several authors who I've read and won't read again. I'm glad I've found another author than can deliver a great crime thriller. As the plot summary notes, the story revolves around three characters. I don't know if these characters appear in other Slaughter novels, but Triptych can be read without reading her other books.
Det. Michael Ormewood has a struggling marriage and a mentally challenged son. He is frustrated when Will Trent, a Georgia Bureau of Investigation Officer, is brought in to help with an investigation. A old prostitute has been murdered, and details of the murder match other similar crimes committed in Atlanta. Angie Polaski is a vice cop and has a lifelong relationship with Will Trent and a love/hate relationship with Ormewood. The third person in the character triangle is John Shelley. John was raised in a perfect home but he turned to drugs and soon found himself being charged with murder. He was convicted and released on parole. While out of jail and trying to buy a TV on credit, the salesman says he has great credit. It seems that while in jail, someone has been using John's name to live a second life.
There is no point in going into more detail except to say that there are three storylines, Ormewood and the murders, Angie Polaksi and Will Trent, and John Shelley. Author Slaughter gives clues but writes deftly enough to hide the complex relationships between the charcters until all three story lines mesh into one incredible set of events.
These events set in motion an invetible climax that takes way too long in coming. Halfway through the novel, I suddenly grasped what Slaughter set out to do and was amazed at her writing skills. Unfortunately, the book was only half over, and the last half of the book, the reader knows so much more than the other characters that it becomes frustrating to watch the characters not be able to figure out. Still, I enjoyed the novel.
This is a gritty, at times vulgar book, that is shockingly fun. Slaughter's characters all have demons and issues. Prostitution, drug use and murder are all there. Slaughter has hooked me in. She writes a different book that someone like Gerritson or Cornwell or Reichs, yet fans of those authors should love books by Karin Slaughter.
 Compelling, but... September 13, 2008
0 out of 3 found this review helpful
Compelling story, but a very slow start with an obvious political slant that added nothing to the tale. This is the 1st Slaughter mystery I have read - I will try another, but the intrigue has to take the lead and not the personal agenda of the author (especially when the asides do nothing to assist in character development or plot).
three and a half stars, really. September 2, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
When Slaughter's first book (Blindsighted) was released, I was actually pretty impressed. Although it was pretty heavy on the violence, it was also pretty heavy on the characters. The plotting was tight and affecting. There was good local color. In short, even though it had many elements that might not have thrilled me, it also had a lot of things that I really liked. I had the feeling that Slaughter had the potential to bring her genre out of the supermarket and airport into somewhere pretty interesting.
Unfortunately, ever since then, I've kind of been waiting for the interesting to happen. Instead of using the ultra-violence as a seasoning, I have the feeling that she has started to depend on it.
(Note: I have the feeling that sometimes I talk about violence like a precious old lady peering over her reading glasses. I really do not object to violence when it is part of the plot, and makes sense in the atmosphere and genre. I do dislike what in last years feels to me an attempt to create the most vicious vile and degrading serial killer around. It is too much, and feels like a violence arms race. It clouds how violent even small acts of violence can be.)
Anyhow, in this sense, Triptych is an improvement over the Grant County books. Violent, yes, but within a rational scale. Unfortunately, in this novel it is the plot tricks which push the book over the top for me. I won't go into the twists and turns, since it could spoil the reading experience. But suffice it to say that the book falls largely flat if you figure out the main gimmick early on, which I did. A high risk strategy, I fear. At least for me, it didn't pay off.
In short, not a bad entry from Slaughter. But it still fails to live up to my initially high expectations of her work.
(I do like Will Trent as a character, by the way. I wouldn't mind seeing more of him in the future.)
Could have been better August 24, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Could have been better
Karin Slaughter's Triptych is a very intricate and complex serial murder mystery that requires the reader to pay attention. Numerous characters and several flashbacks can create some confusion. The story centers on a psychotic serial killer who likes to bite young girls tongues off. Although deranged he somehow manages to live a normal life and it is not until halfway through this complex book that the reader starts to get a handle on just who this person really is. I won't spoil it for you, but nevertheless once you figure it out the story quickly goes downhill. All in all there are simply too many characters and not enough beef (no pun intended). Also, Ms. Slaughter leaves too many loose ends that she never ties up. Again, I won't spoil the story for you but the cardinal rule of a mystery is to not ask a question if you don't have an answer. Triptych is a murder mystery that never quite closes the deal.
Character development was shallow. The plot was rich with potential but Ms. Slaughter never did more than a cursory development of her characters.
Much graphic violence and language so beware. No gratuitous sex.
Mediocre recommend. This is my first Karin Slaughter book and I was not impressed. Again too many loose ends left dangling. I will give her one more shot when I read her new book Fractured. Best to save your money and get the paperback/library edition.
 Very Hard to Put Down August 20, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Triptych has all that great writing qualities that make Karen Slaughter's previous crime/drama/thrillers great novels. The main character is an Atlanta, GA detective named Michael Ormewood, who is confronted with numerous women in the area turning up raped, murdered and mutilated. He is called to the scene of the body of hooker Aleesha Monroe. He is then teamed up with agent Will Trent from the Georgia Bureau of Investigations Special Criminal Apprehension Team and he is not thrilled about it. He shows him files of similar cases, some involving that of teens, that might be related to Aleesha's case.
Then enters a third cop Angie Polaski who is on Vice and has done undercover work as a hooker and it turns out she has had past relations with Ormewood and also knew Trent since childhood. Polaski and Trent had a special bond due to rough childhoods that involved abuse. Convicted killer John Shelley is released from prison after serving a long twenty years and one of the cases matches John Shelley's mode of operation? They think they have the killer and it's a shut case but do they? So all these new twists and turns along with more questions arise making this an enjoyable book and one that is very, very hard to put down.
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