4 out of 4 stars
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Sacrificial Lam by Gary Guinn is a thriller that revolves around Dr. Lambert "Lam" Corso, an English professor at a southern conservative college. Lam was a liberal activist, and he was very popular on campus for supporting homosexuality and immigration. Stirring up controversy and getting into heated arguments were normal for Lam. When he got a threatening "Your judgment is death" note, he played it down against the advice of his wife, Susan, and his friend, Don. The threats turned to violence as Lam was beaten up and almost stabbed to death on campus. Involving the police, campus security, and a home security system did little to deter Lam's assailant from breaking into and vandalizing his home. His wife's business was also vandalized. The police had no leads as the assailant seemed to be a professional. Lam felt compelled to go against his beliefs by acquiring a gun to protect his family. How would this decision affect his family? How far was Lam willing to go to protect his family? Would Lam survive this threat?
Reading the book's description and finding out that the book contained some of my favorite elements and touched a lot of controversial topics had me very excited. I had concerns about the book not meeting my expectations, but after reading I'm pleased to say that it exceeded those expectations. The author uses an intriguing action and suspense-filled prologue to set the tone for the book. He did very well to give believable details about each character that explained their actions.
Sacrificial Lam is fast-paced with a very clear plot, which made it difficult for me to put the book down once I started reading. I liked the way Gary expertly transitioned from one scene to another, especially where he went back and forth between the scene that Lam was attacked on campus and the scene where Susan was attacked at their home. I felt that the suspense in the story climaxed at that point. The book highlighted so many relevant issues like religious extremism, sexuality-based discrimination, abuse, incest, rape, and guns among others. I would have liked the author to have given the conservative characters more room to express the reasons for some of their opinions on these issues.
Furthermore, one of the main things I always look out for while reading books is good editing. Nothing kills the credibility of one's work faster than a book filled with mistakes. On that note, Sacrificial Lam is well edited, and this helped me navigate through the book easily. It also helped that the timeline in the book was clear.
Overall, I enjoyed reading Sacrificial Lam. It was fun trying to figure out who was responsible for the attempts on Lam's life using the clues the author provided. I was able to figure it out long before Gary revealed who it was, but there were other twists towards the end that surprised me. I would recommend this book to fans of suspense and mystery stories. I rate this book 4 out of 4 stars. There wasn't anything I disliked about Sacrificial Lam.
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Sacrificial Lam
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