But it's in the top 10. My practice of waiting until "bestsellers" hit the public library and then checking them out has paid off again! John Berendt must have cynically counted on the low expectations of the American reading public when he threw this book together. My greatest disappointment in the book was that the author didn't care enough about his project to tie any of the innumerable loose ends together. Characters appear at random. Some of them are connected with the "plot" and some apparently are just local color. I think I've put more thought into writing this review than Berendt did into writing the book. With so many good books out there, I'd advise you to read something else.