Best Kept Secret by Jeffrey Archer

I think this is the most disappointed I've ever been by a Jeffrey Archer book.  This is the third book in his "Clifton Chronicles" series, and having enjoyed the first two books, I was eager to read this one.  The second book ended on a bit of a cliff hanger, so I wanted to see how that resolved.

What I usually love about Archer's books is that they keep me intrigued from beginning to end.  There is some sort of mystery that keeps you guessing until the very last page (First Among Equals is a great example).  But that just didn't happen in this book.  This one read like a collection of short stories.  There's a crisis to be solved and it's solved within 50 pages.  Then we're on to the next one.  Then the next.  But there wasn't really a thread through all of them that kept you wondering what was next, they could all have been completely unrelated to each other.  While most of them were interesting, once you finished one there wasn't really anything to keep you reading the next section.

I won't say much about the story line of this one, in case you've read (or are planning to read) the first two books, and I don't want to spoil their stories. This one does end on an exciting cliffhanger again, so now I have to decide if I want to read the next one when it comes out in May. Will it be as good as the first two, or a dud like this one?