Queen of the South

I have a hard time reading a book that believes it is an adaptation of a all-time great novel, and even has the characters in the book REFERENCE reading the book.  That’s a starting place for me to say that Arturo Perez-Reverte’s book Queen of the South fell a bit short for me.  The concept of the book, a mistress of a drug lord from Mexico becoming an even bigger drug lord, being compared to Edmond Dantes, please! Not happening, that is a bit far-fetched.  Teresa Mendoza is in the tub when the “bat-phone” rings, which means her lover has just been killed.  She immediately goes on the run turning to her lover’s old friends to hide her until she lands in Spain and starts a new life, no longer the concubine of a drug king but a developing drug lord herself.  Once you can move beyond the fact that this “wall flower of sorts” is capable of making the big deals, the story line is compelling and the chase scenes and double-dealing of the drug underworld become fun to read.  The distractions do pop-up with this secondary plot of the newspaper journalist looking to find out Teresa’s story years after it happened.  The author uses the present/past/future technique, which is ok, but not the greatest as it takes away from the interest that does build on Teresa’s transformation.  The love triangles (the lesbian lover turned friend/partner in her business) and the new boyfriend, who eventually also gets killed, are added intrigues, as is how the world of drugs is so prevalent in our world.  Money makes people do strange things often.  A good amount of gore, sex (doesn’t seem to fit in to be honest), and back and forth between the actual story makes it confusing.  It almost feels like you are reading three books at times and makes you wonder if they're all part of the same story.  When it focused on the Teresa story, the book worked best for me.  I’d say a 50-50 like/dislike.  Again, the chase scene on the boat and the Teresa escapes from Mexico sections were like a great James Bond movie.  It dragged at parts and too many pages that could have been easily cut without harming the story line.  I’d take a pass on this one.  Not up to the “Count of Monte Cristo” by a  LONG stretch.