"Why was Bibi Blair mysteriously cured of terminal cancer?"
Reviewed by Debbie Wiley
Posted December 21, 2015
Suspense
Bibi Blair has the world before her. Full of expectation
and optimism, Bibi strongly believes in imagining what
her future will be in order to reach those goals and
achieve them. She's happily engaged to a real-life
military hero, Paxton, and her writing career is taking
off. However, it's what Bibi will later call Day One- the
day Bibi's health turned on her as she discovers she is
dying. Bibi doesn't give up, and only two days later
she's not only cured but off on a quest to find the
mysterious ASHLEY BELL. What dangers will await Bibi as
she searches to find the meaning behind her cure?
Dean Koontz has long been a favorite author of mine and
his gift for eloquence is on full display in ASHLEY BELL.
Despite using two of my least favorite plot devices (both
being spoilers so I won't reveal them), I still became
engaged in Bibi Blair's story. The first portion of the
story where we see Bibi's diagnosis and her determination
to fight the cancer are heart-wrenchingly poignant.
Unfortunately, there are several elements that kept
pulling me out of the storyline. ASHLEY BELL is told
through frequent flashbacks and the transitions don't
begin to coalesce into an understandable story until many
more details are revealed. Some of the oddities that are
often intrinsic to a Dean Koontz story seemed a bit
too much in the case of ASHLEY BELL. For instance, I had
no trouble believing Bibi's carefree surfer-loving
parents would refer Bibi to someone like Calida
Butterfly, but I couldn't understand why Bibi bought into
the concept of Scrabblemancy so easily.
ASHLEY BELL is a complex and richly layered story where
every word and every action has multiple meanings. Dean
Koontz is one of the masters of the written word and
ASHLEY BELL is definitely another eloquently written
tale, albeit definitely not one I would rank among my
favorites.
SUMMARY
The girl who said no to death. Bibi Blair is a fierce, funny, dauntless young woman—
whose doctor says
she has one year to live. She replies, “We’ll see.” Her sudden recovery astonishes medical science. An enigmatic woman convinces Bibi that she escaped death
so that she
can save someone else. Someone named Ashley Bell. But save her from what, from whom? And who is Ashley
Bell? Where is
she? Bibi’s obsession with finding Ashley sends her on the run
from threats
both mystical and worldly, including a rich and
charismatic cult
leader with terrifying ambitions. Here is an eloquent, riveting, brilliantly paced story
with an
exhilarating heroine and a twisting, ingenious plot
filled with
staggering surprises. Ashley Bell is a new milestone in
literary
suspense from the long-acclaimed master.
What do you think about this review?
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