Product Description

West Crosse is a stunningly brilliant, strikingly handsome architect with a love of ideal beauty and a commitment to achieving it at any cost. But the rich, powerful families who engage him to design their homes don't know his dark side: Crosse can't stop at designing their dwellings. He needs to make their lives more perfect too, even if it means a gut rehab of the family, even if the final design takes years to achieve-murdering an abusive spouse, a toxic lover, a predatory business partner or an unwanted child. As Crosse is about to embark on the master work of his creative life, the FBI puts Frank Clevenger on the case, and the ultimate cat and mouse game begins.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1426482 in Books
• Published on: 2005-07-05
• Formats: Abridged, Audiobook
• Original language: English
• Binding: Audio CD

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. The strong fifth entry in Ablow's well-received series about FBI forensic psychologist Frank Clevenger (after 2003's Psychopath) features an impressive and sharply detailed heavy, architect West Crosse, who's hailed as a genius for his design skills. But underneath Crosse's art lies a dark soul, a man who wants to engineer human beings to match his perfect buildings at any cost. When a link surfaces among several bodies, each dissected with a brilliant surgeon's skills, Clevenger gets on the case. Crosse, who gave himself a jagged facial scar at age 20 to deliberately spoil his perfect beauty, is now 38. He shocks prospective clients with his opinions ("This is Walter Gropius's house.... It has nothing to do with you," he tells a magnate who proudly inhabits a home designed by the legendary German) and seems not to care if he gets any more work. As for Clevenger, he of course has some personal problems of his own. But Ablow manages to keep them from taking over the story and—miracle of miracles—focuses on the serial killer, that too often poorly drawn staple of so many psychological thrillers, who emerges as a fresh and fully realized creation.
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From AudioFile
A new and intelligent spin on the serial killer genre, Ablow's novel seethes with obsessive-compulsive lust, loyalty, and religious fervor within the rarefied air of moneyed Yale graduates. Ablow's prose would be demanding of any reader, but Denis O'Hare has little trouble separating characters by tone, accent, mannerism, or intent. He also expertly conveys the subtle political satire woven into the story. When he focuses his craft on the killer's psyche, his characterization is chilling and memorable. A disturbingly graphic and yet refined listen, THE ARCHITECT builds anxiety on a blueprint of psychosis and violence. D.J.B. © AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

From Booklist
The Frank Clevenger mysteries keep getting better. Clevenger, a forensic psychiatrist working for the FBI, has always been one of the genre's more interesting protagonists--deeper and darker than psychiatrist/psychologist heroes such as Jonathan Kellerman's Alex Delaware or James Patterson's Alex Cross. And the stories, which pit Clevenger against villains who are at least as clever as he is, have always been tightly written and multilayered. It's actually the villains themselves who are spicing up the series. Take this one, for example: West Crosse, a top-line architect whose need for artistic perfection extends to his hobby--murder. As the Clevenger series has progressed, the villains have evolved from bad guys to elaborately constructed, deeply compelling, almost hypnotically evil (but never cartoony) people. Ablow has yet to reach the summit of his powers, but he's getting closer. David Pitt
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