Thread: James Patterson

Has anyone read or heard of James Patterson? He is a brilliant writer. His novels are crime novels. He is famous for the Alex Cross novels and more recently Maximum Ride and Wizard & Witch novels. He keeps his chapters short. (I like that.) What do you think of him?

Honestly I could never stand him. To me his style is irritatingly ordinary, not bad and not good, just 'meh'. Kind of like the Stephanie Meyer of thriller novels.

I've read a couple of his Alex Cross stories (which I enjoyed), and just recently discovered his Maximum Ride - which I'm having a little more difficulty with. I like the premise, but they do seem to contain a lot of things which say "amateur", strangely enough. The MC seemed almost Mary Sue-ish, the other characters were a bit indistinguishable from each other, and rather than foreshadowing there was predictability. I'd buy an Alex Cross book new, Maximum Ride from the used bin.

James Patterson obviously knows the ingredients of a good story, as he is one of the most popular thriller writers out there. But he can't write for toffee. But neither can Stephanie Meyer, or Dan Brown. But they know how to tell a good story, and that's what readers care about most.