Customer Reviews
An enjoyable read, but over-research gets in the way. - By: K. Street, 08 Nov 2008 
I enjoy Jeffery Deaver books, & have read most of them. There is one thing that has started to irk me slightly about his writing & it is the fact that he has Done His Research, & you know what, he's going to tell you about it! It's been getting worse in recent books, & this is no exception. Within three pages Deaver crowbarred an essay on how kinesics works into the storyline. And not very elegantly either.
However once past that irritation the story picks up, & actuallly becomes very interesting. The characters are well-developed & the narative moves at a good pace, keeping you turning the pages. There are plenty of twists & turns, some more obvious than others. I thought that I had guessed an obvious plot development, & turned out to be completely wrong (which was a good thing!). There is a little lose end at the end of the book which I presume Deaver will pick up in some later story. Overalll, not quite up to Lincoln Rhyme standards but an enjoyable read nonetheless. I just wish Deaver would leave his research notes out of his books!
Fairly Good Thriller - By: J.Flood, 05 Nov 2008 
In The Sleeping Doll, a convicted killer & leader of a cult, Daniel Pell has escaped prison. It is up to the novel's main protagonist, Kathryn Dance, an agent with the California Bureauof Investagation, to track him down. Kathryn is an expert in kinesics - an ability to read body lanuage & behaviour.
I found this book quite a fairly enjoyable read. The cast of characters is quite solid, with the manipulative Daniel Pell, making an interesting, formidable & creepy villian. The character of Kathryn Dance is quite well thought out, also.
I would not cast storyline as a page turner. It is action packed in some parts, slow in others. The story does have the usual Jeffery Deaver twists, though. You may not see these twists coming if you have not read any of this author's novels before. If you have, they might not come as such of a suprise. Overalll, not a bad read, but not as good as the Lincoln Rhyme novels.
Dreary Deaver - By: Sally Holiday Reader, 08 Oct 2008 
I am not a great reader, mainly for holidays. I read the review on the back of the Sleeping Doll, & was hoping to be captivated by this book. I think I had read half the book & was thoroughly bored. I found the book dreary, boring, not exciting,and a good read for bed time, sending me to sleep. I found the book to floury in its writing, too much description in parts, with too many tangents, & not enough details when I'd expect. I found this book to have far too many pages, written text that it did not need. This is my first read by Jeffrey Deaver & probabaly my last
Not Rhyme, but just as good - By: Heather Feather, 14 Sep 2008 I'm a great Deaver fan but was glad of a break from Lincoln Rhyme - I find the Rhyme books can be a bit claustrophic.
I have just finished The Sleeping Doll & it stands alone as being an excellent, very satisfying read - a riveting good story & I would certainly recommend it. (To be quite honest I preferred this book to Deaver's latest The Broken Window.)
Don't be put off by unfavourable reviews !!!
Not quite Lincoln Rhyme, but still good - By: M. V. Clarke, 01 Sep 2008 In The Sleeping Doll, Deaver introduces us to a new principal charater, Kathryn Dance, a kinesics expert, who'd previously had a cameo role in one of the Lincoln Rhyme novels. Dance is a reallly interesting character & I hope that we'll see her again in future novels. This was a very enjoyable book, packed with action, interesting characters & relationships, the high level of factual information that one expects from Deaver, & of course, the customary twists. It follows the story of Daniel Pell, a convicted murderer & cult leader, but now on the run; Dance heads up the operation to recapture him & has to deal with Pell's calculating & violent attempts to gain control over people. The book picks up pace & leads to a great climax but this is followed by a fairly long conclusion, with some interesting, but not particularly exciting twists. A good read, but get to know Deaver through the Lincoln Rhyme series before tackling this.
