When the Wind Blows begins with a young girl running through the Colorado woods, trying to escape the men that are chasing her. When she comes to a ten-foot barbed wire fence with concertina wire running along the top, she is stymied, but only for a minute. She unfurls nine-foot wings and flies away. The hunters, who we now realize are guards, shoot at her.

Anybody who can walk away from this kind of literary hook is more stalwart than I. Pardon the pun, but I was hooked. And stayed that way for the whole thrilling experience.

Two more characters will run a parallel course until they intersect. Kit Harrison is an FBI agent who won't let a particular case rest, even though he's been directed to do so by his superiors. Allegedly vacationing in Nantucket, Harrison instead travels to the Denver area. He's going to question veterinarian Frannie O'Neill, the widow of a slain doctor. Harrison sees a pattern, as yet unacknowledged by his superiors. Doctors, once associated with a renegade medical group, are now being assassinated. Harrison wonders if O'Neill was involved in her husband's murder. He's also trying to track down the actual location where the doctors work. He's heard rumors of human experiments and wants to break this case open.

Frannie is still mourning the murder of her husband. She's slacked off on her vet practice and is recovering in her own way. Her life takes a one-eighty when she sees the impossible. Yes, she's seen the flying child. Trite but true, her life will never be the same.

When the Wind Blows is only the third Patterson I've read. This is a departure but I wasn't upset because I'm not that familiar with his work. I knew that I wasn't getting an Alex Cross book and therefore wasn't bothered. Departure or not, I found the book to be so well-written that I was literally upset and twitchy during the escape scenes. Normally if a story upsets me, I have no problem closing the book. Not here. I was riveted, particularly when Max, the eleven-year-old half-avian, half-human girl is center stage.

Genetic manipulation is a timely topic and can be told with fascinating skill or be so detailed that the story bogs in scientific techno-babble. Patterson does a credible job of making the research and its subsequent results plausible but I never felt as though he had dumbed down the scientific explanations.

This is fast-paced, with short chapters. True, no serial killers lurk but perhaps even more terrifying villains inhabit this story. Humans are used as lab animals, with the unsatisfactory results discarded. Gene manipulation is taken to unthinkable limits, with whole colonies of scientists working together in secret. This scenario is, to me, more heinous than one lone killer. Another aspect of Patterson's talent is apparent in his detailed descriptions of the 'mutants', a term Max uses. When I find myself thinking about characters long after I've finished the book, that's powerful storytelling. I worried about Max and the others. Would they be ridiculed? Imprisoned as lab animals all their lives? Welcomed? I can only hope for the latter. Such was my affection for these characters.

Bottom Line: Some people may feel this book is for the birds. I thought it soared.

--Linda Mowery