Murder Boy by Bryon Quertermous
Polis Books (256 pages)
March 31, 2015
Dominick Prince is in a bit of a bind. Unless his advisor, Parker Farmington, signs off on his thesis, Dominick can’t graduate, and if he doesn't graduate, he can’t accept the teaching fellowship he has lined up in New York. Mind you, Farmington has already rejected said thesis three times and Dominick has little hope he’ll do an about-face without encouragement, so Dominick does what any desperate and delusional crime writer would do: he hatches a plot to kidnap Farmington and forcibly secure his approval. What could possibly go wrong?
Welcome to the literary rock-tumbler that is Bryon Quertermous’ mind. One part manic and one part meta, MURDER BOY is as much a meditation on love, loss, dashed hopes and second chances as it is a crime-filled, gonzo-pulp fever dream fueled by booze and bodily fluids.
The book’s narrative style is idiosyncratic yet engaging, and the same could be said of its protagonist; from page one it’s clear that Dominick is both screwed and screwy, and yet still you can’t help but root for his success (albeit from a safe distance, lest his misfortune be contagious). The pace is breathless. The plot has more twists and turns than a carnival ride. The cast is a bizarrely charismatic crew of academics, thugs, and sociopaths (though you can never tell at any given moment who falls into what category). And while the tone is bleak and the humor is dark, there's a kernel of optimism at MURDER BOY's core.
By the time you reach the final page you may not know which end is up, but that doesn't mean you won’t enjoy the ride; just channel your inner Dominick Prince and go with it.
http://www.polisbooks.com/books/murder-boy/
Showing posts with label The Maine Suspect Reviews. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Maine Suspect Reviews. Show all posts
REVIEW: The Beggar's Opera
The Beggar's Opera by Peggy Blair
Pintail (352 pages)
February 26, 2013
Rating: 9 (Excellent!)
When Canadian police detective Mike Ellis takes his wife Hillary to Old Havana for Christmas, he hopes the trip will repair both his damaged psyche and their failing marriage. Mike would have been better off staying home for the holidays, though, for not only does Hillary leave him (and Cuba) on Christmas Eve, but on Christmas Day, Mike is taken into custody by the Cuban police for a heinous crime he didn’t commit. Or, at least, he doesn’t remember committing it…
Cuban law dictates the police have three days from the time of arrest to indict a suspect or they must let him go. Inspector Ricardo Ramirez, head of the Havana Major Crimes Unit, is determined to make a timely case against Mike lest he be freed and flee the island. Mike is positive he’s innocent, but unless he can prove it, he’ll be transferred to prison where he’ll either be killed in his cell or die in front of a firing squad (whichever comes first).
The clock is ticking. What really happened in Old Havana on Christmas Eve? Does Inspector Ramirez actually care? Will Mike Ellis live long enough to find out? A lot can happen in three days’ time…
Equal parts mainstream thriller and David-Lynchian fever dream, The Beggar’s Opera by Peggy Blair is a beautifully written, quickly paced, cleverly crafted novel that is singularly unlike anything else I’ve ever read. Blair’s storytelling style is perhaps best described as teasing. Her characters may be under the gun, but Blair herself suffers from no such affliction, instead opting to slowly, methodically, stingily dole out the pieces of her puzzle in order to create an aura of tension, menace, and dread. The Beggar’s Opera is chock full of challenging subject matter, but to her credit, Blair never shocks without good reason; be it sexual abuse, rape, murder, prostitution, poverty, gender reassignment, corruption, physical deformity, or terminal illness, her button-pushing is always done in service of the plot. To a one, her characters are unique, compelling, and fully fleshed, and Blair does a remarkable job of bringing Cuba to life on the page. She somehow manages to deliver lessons on history, politics, and culture without making them feel like lectures, and successfully highlights the blatant corruption, shocking brutality, and devastating poverty that plague Cuba without appearing to pass judgment on the island or its people; she neither romanticizes nor vilifies, but instead does her best to paint an honest portrait of the country – warts, beauty marks, and all.
The Beggar’s Opera informs, it entertains, it’ll break your heart and then lift your spirits a dozen times over, and it’ll almost certainly convince you the only way you want to visit Cuba is via the pages of a good book. As someone from the Canadian embassy tells Mike after his arrest, “There’s no point sugar-coating things: Cuba is what it is. If you’d asked me where to go for a Cuban holiday experience, I would have told you to go to Miami and eat a jerked pork sandwich. I wish people would inform themselves a bit before they come here. It would really make things easier.” Consider me informed, Ms. Blair – thank you, and well done.
REVIEW: Assaulted Pretzel
Assaulted Pretzel by Laura Bradford
Berkley Prime Crime (288 pages)
March 5, 2013
Rating: 8 (Good!)
For fans of: Paige Shelton
Claire Weatherly loves the life she’s carved out for herself in the small town of Heavenly, Pennsylvania. She loves living in Sleep Heavenly, the bed-and-breakfast owned by her Aunt Diane. She loves running her own gift shop, Heavenly Treasures, and selling local products to the tourists who pass through. And she loves how much quieter and simpler life is in Heavenly, thanks in no small part to the presence of the Amish families who also call the town their home.
But that quiet simplicity is shattered when toy manufacturer Rob Karble is murdered during a visit to Heavenly. Rumor has it that Karble came to town under the pretense of forging a partnership with local Amish toymakers, but backed out of the deal after procuring copies of the toymakers’ designs. Did Karble’s backroom dealings get him killed – or is there more going on in sleepy little Heavenly than meets the eye?
Assaulted Pretzel is the second in Laura Bradford’s Amish Mystery series, and it’s a wonderfully engaging read. The book has a strong sense of place; Heavenly comes to life on the page by virtue of Bradford’s vibrant prose, and in Sleep Heavenly, she’s created one of the warmest, coziest, most inviting retreats a reader could ever hope to visit (in person or via fiction). The story is cleverly plotted and quickly paced, and the mystery is remarkably well constructed, with a nice collection of plausible suspects and a host of expertly deployed clues.
Bradford does a fantastic job of introducing the reader to what’s essentially a foreign culture. The rules by which the Amish live are complex and are vastly different than those followed by their “English” counterparts, but Bradford not only manages to explain them without employing a single info dump, but uses them to enrich and complicate her tale, as well. The interpersonal relationships alone are enough to make your head spin, and Bradford deserves a ton of credit for choosing such a unique and fertile theme for her series.
Bradford’s character development skills are strong. Claire’s occasionally a little too earnest for my taste, but when she’s not busy channeling Pollyanna she makes for a strong and determined heroine. Good friend and potential love interest Jakob is a skilled and dedicated detective, and is made all the more interesting by the fact that he decided to leave Heavenly to become a cop after he was baptized into the Amish faith – an act that earn him ostracization by his family and his community. And the love triangle that’s developing between Claire, Jakob, and Jakob’s still-Amish childhood rival Benjamin is positively riveting. To call the situation complicated would be a gross understatement, and the relationships forming between the three of them alone are reason enough for me to seek out the next installment of Laura Bradford’s Amish Mysteries.
-Kat
Berkley Prime Crime (288 pages)
March 5, 2013
Rating: 8 (Good!)
For fans of: Paige Shelton
Claire Weatherly loves the life she’s carved out for herself in the small town of Heavenly, Pennsylvania. She loves living in Sleep Heavenly, the bed-and-breakfast owned by her Aunt Diane. She loves running her own gift shop, Heavenly Treasures, and selling local products to the tourists who pass through. And she loves how much quieter and simpler life is in Heavenly, thanks in no small part to the presence of the Amish families who also call the town their home.
But that quiet simplicity is shattered when toy manufacturer Rob Karble is murdered during a visit to Heavenly. Rumor has it that Karble came to town under the pretense of forging a partnership with local Amish toymakers, but backed out of the deal after procuring copies of the toymakers’ designs. Did Karble’s backroom dealings get him killed – or is there more going on in sleepy little Heavenly than meets the eye?
Assaulted Pretzel is the second in Laura Bradford’s Amish Mystery series, and it’s a wonderfully engaging read. The book has a strong sense of place; Heavenly comes to life on the page by virtue of Bradford’s vibrant prose, and in Sleep Heavenly, she’s created one of the warmest, coziest, most inviting retreats a reader could ever hope to visit (in person or via fiction). The story is cleverly plotted and quickly paced, and the mystery is remarkably well constructed, with a nice collection of plausible suspects and a host of expertly deployed clues.
Bradford does a fantastic job of introducing the reader to what’s essentially a foreign culture. The rules by which the Amish live are complex and are vastly different than those followed by their “English” counterparts, but Bradford not only manages to explain them without employing a single info dump, but uses them to enrich and complicate her tale, as well. The interpersonal relationships alone are enough to make your head spin, and Bradford deserves a ton of credit for choosing such a unique and fertile theme for her series.
Bradford’s character development skills are strong. Claire’s occasionally a little too earnest for my taste, but when she’s not busy channeling Pollyanna she makes for a strong and determined heroine. Good friend and potential love interest Jakob is a skilled and dedicated detective, and is made all the more interesting by the fact that he decided to leave Heavenly to become a cop after he was baptized into the Amish faith – an act that earn him ostracization by his family and his community. And the love triangle that’s developing between Claire, Jakob, and Jakob’s still-Amish childhood rival Benjamin is positively riveting. To call the situation complicated would be a gross understatement, and the relationships forming between the three of them alone are reason enough for me to seek out the next installment of Laura Bradford’s Amish Mysteries.
-Kat
REVIEW: Sweet Tea Revenge
Sweet Tea Revenge by Laura Childs
Berkley Prime Crime (336 pages)
March 5, 2013
Rating: 6 (Just okay. It had its strong points, but...)
For fans of: Joanne Fluke
When Indigo Tea Shop proprietress Theodosia Browning agrees to be Delaine Dish’s maid of honor, she assumes her biggest chore will be keeping the high-maintenance bride from melting down long enough to officially become groom Dougan Granville’s problem. Unfortunately, however, that accomplishment isn’t meant to be, for Theodosia finds poor Dougan dead in his room just minutes before the ceremony’s scheduled to begin. Who killed Delaine’s fiancé, and why? Theodosia must help the local police get to the bottom of this particular mystery if her friend’s ever to receive any closure.
Sweet Tea Revenge is the fourteenth of Laura Childs’ Tea Shop Mysteries, and it’s a decidedly ho-hum addition to the series. Childs’ prose is, as usual, overwrought and preposterously florid; the book is drowning in so many adjectives, adverbs, metaphors, and exclamation points that you occasionally lose track of the plot. The pace is slow, there isn’t much action or drama, and the stakes are incredibly low, with nobody of import in danger of being killed or arrested, and no real pressing need to solve Dougan’s murder. The mystery itself is hastily sketched and shoddily constructed, with both the circumstances of the murder and the investigation into it straining credulity. There aren’t enough clues, the suspects are woefully underdeveloped, and the Big Showdown between Theodosia and the murderer is nothing short of ridiculous.
That’s not to say that Sweet Tea Revenge has no redeeming qualities, however. Theodosia and the other Indigo employees, Drayton and Haley, are charming as ever, and actually make for pretty great company. For you camellia sinensis aficionados out there, this tale contains a ton of information about exotic teas (and even features some tips and a lengthy list of tea resources). And the book has an incredibly strong sense of place, with Charleston and its homes and businesses coming to life in Childs’ hands. In particular, I find myself wishing the Indigo Tea Shop actually existed; between Drayton’s amazing collection of teas, Haley’s drool-worthy assortments of sweets and savories, and the tranquil and cozy yet still genteel atmosphere of the space itself, I can’t imagine a better place to escape to on a sunny afternoon. Ultimately, that’s what keeps me coming back to this series, installment after installment – because everybody needs a cozy getaway, even if it’s located between the covers of a book.
-Kat
Berkley Prime Crime (336 pages)
March 5, 2013
Rating: 6 (Just okay. It had its strong points, but...)
For fans of: Joanne Fluke
When Indigo Tea Shop proprietress Theodosia Browning agrees to be Delaine Dish’s maid of honor, she assumes her biggest chore will be keeping the high-maintenance bride from melting down long enough to officially become groom Dougan Granville’s problem. Unfortunately, however, that accomplishment isn’t meant to be, for Theodosia finds poor Dougan dead in his room just minutes before the ceremony’s scheduled to begin. Who killed Delaine’s fiancé, and why? Theodosia must help the local police get to the bottom of this particular mystery if her friend’s ever to receive any closure.
Sweet Tea Revenge is the fourteenth of Laura Childs’ Tea Shop Mysteries, and it’s a decidedly ho-hum addition to the series. Childs’ prose is, as usual, overwrought and preposterously florid; the book is drowning in so many adjectives, adverbs, metaphors, and exclamation points that you occasionally lose track of the plot. The pace is slow, there isn’t much action or drama, and the stakes are incredibly low, with nobody of import in danger of being killed or arrested, and no real pressing need to solve Dougan’s murder. The mystery itself is hastily sketched and shoddily constructed, with both the circumstances of the murder and the investigation into it straining credulity. There aren’t enough clues, the suspects are woefully underdeveloped, and the Big Showdown between Theodosia and the murderer is nothing short of ridiculous.
That’s not to say that Sweet Tea Revenge has no redeeming qualities, however. Theodosia and the other Indigo employees, Drayton and Haley, are charming as ever, and actually make for pretty great company. For you camellia sinensis aficionados out there, this tale contains a ton of information about exotic teas (and even features some tips and a lengthy list of tea resources). And the book has an incredibly strong sense of place, with Charleston and its homes and businesses coming to life in Childs’ hands. In particular, I find myself wishing the Indigo Tea Shop actually existed; between Drayton’s amazing collection of teas, Haley’s drool-worthy assortments of sweets and savories, and the tranquil and cozy yet still genteel atmosphere of the space itself, I can’t imagine a better place to escape to on a sunny afternoon. Ultimately, that’s what keeps me coming back to this series, installment after installment – because everybody needs a cozy getaway, even if it’s located between the covers of a book.
-Kat
REVIEW: Nickeled-and-Dimed to Death
Nickeled-and-Dimed to Death by Denise Swanson
Obsidian (272 pages)
March 5, 2013
Rating: 9/10
For fans of: Jenn McKinlay, Diane Kelly
When Elise Whitmore shows up at Devereaux "Dev" Sinclair's five-and-dime store and offers her a fantastic price on some antique Easter-candy molds, Dev doesn't think too much of it; the woman is probably either cleaning out her attic or needs some extra spending money. But then Dev learns that Elise is going through a nasty divorce and has been sticking it to her husband by systematically unloading all of his family heirlooms, and she feels a twinge of concern; in buying the molds from Elise, did Dev take possession of stolen property?
That question falls to the back burner when Elise turns up dead, though – particularly since Dev's friend Boone is the one to discover the body and immediately becomes the police’s prime suspect. Dev knows Boone is innocent, but the chief remains unconvinced. Can Dev exonerate Boone and help the cops catch the real culprit, or is her friend doomed to do time for a crime he didn’t commit?
Nickeled-and-Dimed to Death is the second of Denise Swanson’s Devereaux’s Dime Store Mysteries, and it’s a fabulously entertaining read. The pace is quick, the prose is snappy, and the dialogue is sharp. The mystery is incredibly successful, too – elegant in both design and construction. Yes, the clues are smart, the suspects are well developed, and the solution is satisfying, but Swanson also manages to connect the book’s central whodunit to the series as a whole; the Big Reveal not only ties off the book’s loose ends, but casts a whole new light on Dev’s past – and possibly her future, as well.
I do have a minor complaint regarding the way Swanson chose to tell this particular tale. The majority of the book is recounted in the first person from Dev’s perspective. Dev has a very engaging and propulsive narrative style, and her chapters read very naturally. Unfortunately, however, for whatever reason, Swanson chooses to occasionally slip into the third person and tell snippets of the story from Dev’s high-school sweetheart Noah’s point of view. Not only are the transitions from first-person to third-person awkward and jarring, but Noah’s voice never quite rings true, and I actually found that I liked him a little less every time I was forced to spend a chapter in (adjacent to?) his head.
That said, the cast of Nickeled-and-Dimed to Death is flush with incredibly well drawn characters, each with his or her own unique personality, motivation, mannerisms, and background. Dev is as sweet, loyal, and stubborn as they come. Her good friend Poppy, bartender and antagonistic wild-child daughter of the local police chief, is both a supportive sidekick and fantastic comic relief. And Dev’s high-school sweetheart Noah proves a surprisingly likable addition to the group – and does a great job of throwing a wrench into the post-adolescent existence Dev’s been carving out for herself. The relationship between Dev and Noah is at once incredibly complicated and yet very simple, and does a great job of illustrating just how difficult it can be to put the past behind you in matters of romance – particularly when you live in a small town.
-Kat
Obsidian (272 pages)
March 5, 2013
Rating: 9/10
For fans of: Jenn McKinlay, Diane Kelly
When Elise Whitmore shows up at Devereaux "Dev" Sinclair's five-and-dime store and offers her a fantastic price on some antique Easter-candy molds, Dev doesn't think too much of it; the woman is probably either cleaning out her attic or needs some extra spending money. But then Dev learns that Elise is going through a nasty divorce and has been sticking it to her husband by systematically unloading all of his family heirlooms, and she feels a twinge of concern; in buying the molds from Elise, did Dev take possession of stolen property?
That question falls to the back burner when Elise turns up dead, though – particularly since Dev's friend Boone is the one to discover the body and immediately becomes the police’s prime suspect. Dev knows Boone is innocent, but the chief remains unconvinced. Can Dev exonerate Boone and help the cops catch the real culprit, or is her friend doomed to do time for a crime he didn’t commit?
Nickeled-and-Dimed to Death is the second of Denise Swanson’s Devereaux’s Dime Store Mysteries, and it’s a fabulously entertaining read. The pace is quick, the prose is snappy, and the dialogue is sharp. The mystery is incredibly successful, too – elegant in both design and construction. Yes, the clues are smart, the suspects are well developed, and the solution is satisfying, but Swanson also manages to connect the book’s central whodunit to the series as a whole; the Big Reveal not only ties off the book’s loose ends, but casts a whole new light on Dev’s past – and possibly her future, as well.
I do have a minor complaint regarding the way Swanson chose to tell this particular tale. The majority of the book is recounted in the first person from Dev’s perspective. Dev has a very engaging and propulsive narrative style, and her chapters read very naturally. Unfortunately, however, for whatever reason, Swanson chooses to occasionally slip into the third person and tell snippets of the story from Dev’s high-school sweetheart Noah’s point of view. Not only are the transitions from first-person to third-person awkward and jarring, but Noah’s voice never quite rings true, and I actually found that I liked him a little less every time I was forced to spend a chapter in (adjacent to?) his head.
That said, the cast of Nickeled-and-Dimed to Death is flush with incredibly well drawn characters, each with his or her own unique personality, motivation, mannerisms, and background. Dev is as sweet, loyal, and stubborn as they come. Her good friend Poppy, bartender and antagonistic wild-child daughter of the local police chief, is both a supportive sidekick and fantastic comic relief. And Dev’s high-school sweetheart Noah proves a surprisingly likable addition to the group – and does a great job of throwing a wrench into the post-adolescent existence Dev’s been carving out for herself. The relationship between Dev and Noah is at once incredibly complicated and yet very simple, and does a great job of illustrating just how difficult it can be to put the past behind you in matters of romance – particularly when you live in a small town.
-Kat
REVIEW: Evil in All Its Disguises
Evil in All Its Disguises by Hilary Davidson
Forge (352 pages)
March 5, 2013
Rating: 9 (Excellent!)
When travel writer Lily Moore signs on for an all-expenses-paid press trip to Acapulco, Mexico, she expects to spend a few days seeing the sights and being pampered in a ritzy hotel. She does not, however, expect for said ritzy hotel to be owned by her ex-fiancé. Or for fellow travel journalist Skye McDermott to vanish in the middle of dinner, just moments after dropping hints to Lily about a new exposé on which she’s working – an exposé that may or may not be about said ex-fiancé. And yet…
Before Skye went missing, it was Lily’s plan to decamp to a new hotel ASAP. But since neither her fellow travelers nor the hotel staff will lift a finger to help her find her friend and the police in Mexico are notoriously corrupt, she decides that before she can leave, she must first endeavor to locate Skye herself. That task isn’t as simple as it sounds, though – particularly since it seems Lily’s been lured down to Acapulco under false pretenses and is now essentially a prisoner.
Evil in All Its Disguises is the third of Hilary Davidson’s Lily Moore novels, and it’s her best to date. A twisty, turny tale, full of cons within cons and feints within feints, Davidson’s latest is so compulsively readable, the pages practically turn themselves. Every time you think you've got it all figured out, the story takes another left turn and deposits you back at square one. And Davidson’s cinematic storytelling style coupled with her prose – at once elegant and refined, yet still lush, vivid, and approachable – only adds to this book’s rather considerable charms.
Most people think of hotels as homes away from home; places of safety and refuge, where at the end of the day, you can lock your door and let your guard down, secure in the knowledge that you’re on friendly soil. In Evil in All Its Disguises, Davidson beautifully illustrates – and then mercilessly exploits – that concept, exploring what it means for one’s sanctuary to become a cell – and a claustrophobic one, at that. The clouds are low, the air is close, and the hotel in which she’s being held captive is not only isolated, it’s practically deserted, all of which conspire to make it feel as though Lily's trapped in a twisted Hitchcockian nightmare.
Davidson tells this tale with a glorious economy of characters, which helps her to achieve two things. First, it lends the book an air of intimacy and intensity, making the whole thing feel a bit like a locked-room mystery. And second, it causes the reader to wonder whether he or she is truly watching a conspiracy unfold, or is instead witnessing Lily’s Poe-like descent into madness. Because Lily is traveling alone and therefore lacks a trusted ally to ground her and lend her perspective, the reader has no way of knowing whether Lily’s single-minded obsession with Skye’s disappearance is warranted, or is just bugnuts insane. Lily’s suspicions are so elaborate, and she’s so intent on solving a mystery whose existence nobody else is even willing to grant, that you genuinely start to consider the possibility she’s delusional. And while that’s not great for Lily, it definitely makes for entertaining reading.
Do yourself a favor and add this one to the TBR pile, and stat.
Forge (352 pages)
March 5, 2013
Rating: 9 (Excellent!)
When travel writer Lily Moore signs on for an all-expenses-paid press trip to Acapulco, Mexico, she expects to spend a few days seeing the sights and being pampered in a ritzy hotel. She does not, however, expect for said ritzy hotel to be owned by her ex-fiancé. Or for fellow travel journalist Skye McDermott to vanish in the middle of dinner, just moments after dropping hints to Lily about a new exposé on which she’s working – an exposé that may or may not be about said ex-fiancé. And yet…
Before Skye went missing, it was Lily’s plan to decamp to a new hotel ASAP. But since neither her fellow travelers nor the hotel staff will lift a finger to help her find her friend and the police in Mexico are notoriously corrupt, she decides that before she can leave, she must first endeavor to locate Skye herself. That task isn’t as simple as it sounds, though – particularly since it seems Lily’s been lured down to Acapulco under false pretenses and is now essentially a prisoner.
Evil in All Its Disguises is the third of Hilary Davidson’s Lily Moore novels, and it’s her best to date. A twisty, turny tale, full of cons within cons and feints within feints, Davidson’s latest is so compulsively readable, the pages practically turn themselves. Every time you think you've got it all figured out, the story takes another left turn and deposits you back at square one. And Davidson’s cinematic storytelling style coupled with her prose – at once elegant and refined, yet still lush, vivid, and approachable – only adds to this book’s rather considerable charms.
Most people think of hotels as homes away from home; places of safety and refuge, where at the end of the day, you can lock your door and let your guard down, secure in the knowledge that you’re on friendly soil. In Evil in All Its Disguises, Davidson beautifully illustrates – and then mercilessly exploits – that concept, exploring what it means for one’s sanctuary to become a cell – and a claustrophobic one, at that. The clouds are low, the air is close, and the hotel in which she’s being held captive is not only isolated, it’s practically deserted, all of which conspire to make it feel as though Lily's trapped in a twisted Hitchcockian nightmare.
Davidson tells this tale with a glorious economy of characters, which helps her to achieve two things. First, it lends the book an air of intimacy and intensity, making the whole thing feel a bit like a locked-room mystery. And second, it causes the reader to wonder whether he or she is truly watching a conspiracy unfold, or is instead witnessing Lily’s Poe-like descent into madness. Because Lily is traveling alone and therefore lacks a trusted ally to ground her and lend her perspective, the reader has no way of knowing whether Lily’s single-minded obsession with Skye’s disappearance is warranted, or is just bugnuts insane. Lily’s suspicions are so elaborate, and she’s so intent on solving a mystery whose existence nobody else is even willing to grant, that you genuinely start to consider the possibility she’s delusional. And while that’s not great for Lily, it definitely makes for entertaining reading.
Do yourself a favor and add this one to the TBR pile, and stat.
REVIEW: One Hot Murder
One Hot Murder by Lorraine Bartlett
Berkley Prime Crime (304 pages)
February 5, 2013
For fans of: Maggie
Sefton
Rating: 7 (A decent read.)
Ever since Katie Bonner inherited the failing artists' co-op
known as Artisans Alley, she's had to work extra hard just to keep the place
from falling into bankruptcy. The Alley needs to draw in every customer it can to
stay afloat, so when one of the neighboring shops is torched by an arsonist and
the police find an unidentified corpse inside, Katie worries the negative
publicity associated with the crimes could do serious damage to the co-op's
bottom line. Can she help the police catch the culprit and close the case
before the customers start to flee, or will the criminal's next victim be the
Alley, itself?
One Hot Murder is
the third of Lorraine Bartlett’s Victoria
Square Mysteries, and about half of it is a really entertaining read. Unfortunately, it’s the second half of
the book that’s worth your time, which means that in order to get there, you’re
going to have to slog through the first 150 pages. Not that the first 150 pages are unreadable; far from
it. But the pace is slow, there’s not
much action or drama, and the drama that is
there feels forced and manufactured. Most of the scenes have little, if anything, to do with the
central mystery, and instead only serve to document the petty infighting that’s
taking place amongst the vendors and merchants. As a result, being in Katie’s head for this part of the book
makes you feel like you’re tagging along with someone as they progress through
an incredibly aggravating workweek, and that’s not much fun for anyone
involved. Nobody really seems to
care that someone’s dead or that there’s a killer on the loose, which means
there’s no sense of urgency, and Bartlett never quite brings Artisans Alley to
life, which makes it even harder to get caught up in Katie’s narrative.
The back half of Bartlett’s tale is actually quite
engrossing, though. The mystery is
complex and very neatly constructed, and there are some genuinely clever twists
and red herrings mixed in.
Bartlett’s fashioned a puzzle that will definitely keep readers
guessing, and if you can make it this far, you’ll have a hard time putting the
book down until you’ve reached the end.
Katie is a decent heroine; she’s definitely got gumption and
isn’t afraid to take control of a situation to get what she wants, even if it
means stepping on some toes or ruffling some feathers. And I really like the way her
relationship with formerly grumpy Detective Ray Davenport is progressing; it’s
sweet, and it’s funny, and there’s not an ounce of romance to it, which is kind
of refreshing for a traditional mystery cop-sleuth partnership. Unfortunately, however, she shares
almost no chemistry with purported love interest Andy, which makes for some
awkward scenes. The couple comes off more like brother and sister than a pair
of lovers, and I found myself desperately hoping some new potential suitor would
appear on the scene.
The best traditional mysteries are never all about the
mystery – I know that; but there should never be so much padding that one occasionally
can’t even find the mystery. Especially if said mystery is good
enough to deserve center stage.
-Kat
REVIEW: Buried in a Bog
Buried in a Bog by Sheila Connolly
Berkley Prime Crime (304 pages)
February 5, 2013
Rating: 8 (Good!)
For fans of: Nancy Atherton
When Maura Donovan agrees to grant her grandmother Nora's dying wish and travel to Ireland to visit the village of Leap (where Nora was born), she doesn't think she's signing on for anything that'll take longer than a week. She figures she'll seek out some of her grandmother's old friends, see the sights, and come home again.
Life never works out quite as one plans, though, and before she knows it, Maura's befriending the locals and lending a hand down at the village pub. It's only for a few months, she tells herself – just until the pub's managers can figure some things out, and until Maura decides what she wants to do with her life now that there's nothing keeping her in Boston. But when a body's pulled out of the bog, another villager turns up dead, and Maura starts receiving threats, she's forced to wonder if she's destined to become a permanent resident of Leap – with an address in the local cemetery.
Buried in a Bog is the first of Sheila Connolly’s new County Cork Mysteries, and if the quality of this book is any indication, Berkley has another winner of a series on their hands. Connolly’s latest is a captivating tale – sweet, nostalgic, and full of Irish charm, but also tightly plotted and full of twists, turns, and shocking reveals. There's a strong sense of place; Connolly's lush and vivid descriptions virtually transport the reader to the Irish countryside. And the book reads almost like a love letter to Irish history, culture, and genealogy; Buried in a Bog is as much a mystery as it a story of self-discovery and rebirth – of uncovering one’s history, and in doing so, stumbling across one’s path to the future.
Connolly’s characters are likable and well drawn, but I must admit to mixed feelings regarding Maura as a heroine. On the one hand, you can’t help but feel sorry for her; her father’s dead, her mother abandoned her, and the grandmother who raised her just died of cancer, essentially leaving her both homeless and penniless. And you have to admire her sense of adventure, what with her spur-of-the-moment decision to (at least temporarily) relocate to Ireland and to try and make a go of it. But neither of these things quite makes up for the fact that Maura’s about as judgmental as they come – especially considering her young age, her relatively poor upbringing, and her current station in life. Her critical nature makes it difficult to truly like her, no matter how much you may want to do so, and that’s probably my biggest knock about this book. She does mellow a bit over the course of this first installment in her tale, and I have a feeling she’ll continue to do so as she acclimates to her new life and the people in it, but for this book, at least, Maura comes off more like a cranky, bitter old lady than she does a young woman with her whole life ahead of her.
That said, Connolly absolutely nails the book’s ending, tying up all the story's loose ends and rather nicely setting up the rest of the series. Sheila Connolly’s County Cork Mysteries have a ton of promise, and I, for one, can’t wait to see where Connolly chooses to take her readers next.
-Kat
Berkley Prime Crime (304 pages)
February 5, 2013
Rating: 8 (Good!)
For fans of: Nancy Atherton
When Maura Donovan agrees to grant her grandmother Nora's dying wish and travel to Ireland to visit the village of Leap (where Nora was born), she doesn't think she's signing on for anything that'll take longer than a week. She figures she'll seek out some of her grandmother's old friends, see the sights, and come home again.
Life never works out quite as one plans, though, and before she knows it, Maura's befriending the locals and lending a hand down at the village pub. It's only for a few months, she tells herself – just until the pub's managers can figure some things out, and until Maura decides what she wants to do with her life now that there's nothing keeping her in Boston. But when a body's pulled out of the bog, another villager turns up dead, and Maura starts receiving threats, she's forced to wonder if she's destined to become a permanent resident of Leap – with an address in the local cemetery.
Buried in a Bog is the first of Sheila Connolly’s new County Cork Mysteries, and if the quality of this book is any indication, Berkley has another winner of a series on their hands. Connolly’s latest is a captivating tale – sweet, nostalgic, and full of Irish charm, but also tightly plotted and full of twists, turns, and shocking reveals. There's a strong sense of place; Connolly's lush and vivid descriptions virtually transport the reader to the Irish countryside. And the book reads almost like a love letter to Irish history, culture, and genealogy; Buried in a Bog is as much a mystery as it a story of self-discovery and rebirth – of uncovering one’s history, and in doing so, stumbling across one’s path to the future.
Connolly’s characters are likable and well drawn, but I must admit to mixed feelings regarding Maura as a heroine. On the one hand, you can’t help but feel sorry for her; her father’s dead, her mother abandoned her, and the grandmother who raised her just died of cancer, essentially leaving her both homeless and penniless. And you have to admire her sense of adventure, what with her spur-of-the-moment decision to (at least temporarily) relocate to Ireland and to try and make a go of it. But neither of these things quite makes up for the fact that Maura’s about as judgmental as they come – especially considering her young age, her relatively poor upbringing, and her current station in life. Her critical nature makes it difficult to truly like her, no matter how much you may want to do so, and that’s probably my biggest knock about this book. She does mellow a bit over the course of this first installment in her tale, and I have a feeling she’ll continue to do so as she acclimates to her new life and the people in it, but for this book, at least, Maura comes off more like a cranky, bitter old lady than she does a young woman with her whole life ahead of her.
That said, Connolly absolutely nails the book’s ending, tying up all the story's loose ends and rather nicely setting up the rest of the series. Sheila Connolly’s County Cork Mysteries have a ton of promise, and I, for one, can’t wait to see where Connolly chooses to take her readers next.
-Kat
REVIEW: Town in a Pumpkin Bash
Town in a Pumpkin Bash by B.B. Haywood
Berkley Prime Crime (336 pages)
February 5, 2013
For fans of:
Joanne Fluke
Rating: 8 (Good!)
When Maine blueberry farmer Candy Holliday agrees to help
her friend Maggie tend old Mr. Gumm’s pumpkin patch through the fall season,
she figures it’ll be an easy way to have some fun while making some extra
cash. She does not, however,
expect that she and Maggie will stumble across a dead body buried in a pile of
pumpkins just days before Halloween, or that the discovery will land her smack
in the middle of yet another murder investigation. The deeper Candy digs, the more it seems the killer meant
for her to find the corpse and become involved in the case. But if so, who? And perhaps more importantly, why?
Town in a Pumpkin
Bash is the fourth of B.B. Haywood’s Candy Holliday Mysteries, and it’s her best to date. The previous installments in Haywood’s
series have been entertaining, but historically, her attempts to make her books
and her characters seem authentically Maine-y have been so over-the-top that I
actually found them insulting. (Yes, I’m from Maine, so I may be a little
overly sensitive about such matters, but to me, it felt like Haywood spent half
of each book waving her hands and screaming, “This is what Maine people eat!
This is what Maine people wear! This is how Maine people talk! Isn’t it
craaazzzyyyy?” Maine is a state, people – not an alien planet; get a grip.)
I’m happy to report, however, that with Town in a Pumpkin Bash, Haywood has finally written a book that
feels like it actually takes place in Maine. The characters are quirky and colorful, but not too. The town is small and quaint, but not
nauseatingly so. And she drops
just enough Maine facts and trivia into the mix to lend context and veracity to
her tale, but not so many as to disrupt the flow of the story.
Haywood’s prose is artful and fun, her narrative style is
engaging, and the two central mysteries (one past and one present) are clever,
complex, and connect quite seamlessly.
The story is perfectly paced, with twists, clues, confrontations, and
red herrings dropped in all the right places, and Haywood manages to keep the
reader guessing until the very end.
I confess, I wish she’d spent a little more time developing her suspects
(after I read the Big Reveal, I didn’t recall having met the culprit and had to
page back and figure out who said culprit was in relation to the rest of the
story), but in the grand scheme of things, that’s a relatively minor quibble.
If you’re sick of the cold and the snow and are yearning to
escape to someplace a little more exciting and a little less bleak, look no
further than Town in Pumpkin Bash by
B.B.
Haywood; come for the beautiful Maine foliage, stay for the intrigue
and the dead bodies.
-Kat
REVIEW: The Next One to Fall
The Next One to Fall by Hilary Davidson
Forge, February 2012
Rating: 9/10
Travel writer Lily Moore and her best friend, photographer Jesse Robb, traveled to Peru to see the sights, hike the Inca Trail, and shake off the dark cloud that’s been trailing Lily ever since tragedy rocked her world just three months prior. It seems a carefree vacation is not the cards for the pair, however, for when they reach Machu Picchu, they happen across a woman clinging to life in the ruins. Jesse runs to get help, but the woman’s beyond saving, and before she passes, she tells Lily the name of her killer and implores her to share this information with the police.
The local authorities conduct a brief investigation and ultimately rule the death an accident, but Lily’s convinced there’s more to the story. Jesse begs her to let the matter drop, but Lily refuses, and before long, the two find themselves ensnared in a web the likes of which they may never escape – a web of violence, lies, money, and murder.
The Next One to Fall is the sequel to author Hilary Davidson’s stellar debut, The Damage Done, and it’s quite simply a fantastic read. Equal parts action-adventure thriller and classic paranoia tale (with a touch of Peruvian travelogue thrown in for good measure), Davidson’s latest is an intelligent, atmospheric, heart-stopping tour-de-force, guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat. The prose is graceful, the pace is electric, and the mystery will keep you guessing until the very end.
The book has a timeless quality to it that, when coupled with the exotic locale and the story’s quiet air of menace, puts me in mind of Katherine Neville’s The Eight, and Davidson’s plot is positively Hitchcockian; rife with staircases, trains, mistaken identities, and charming sociopaths, everybody’s lying about something and everyone’s got an agenda, making it impossible for Lily (or the reader) to determine who – if anyone – can be trusted.
What I find most impressive about this book, though, is the way Davidson uses the fact of the mystery, itself, as a plot device. The Lily we meet at the start of this book is a ghost of her former self; unable to come to grips with all that’s happened to her, she’s drifting through life on autopilot, keeping everything and everyone at arm’s length. But while the events of The Damage Done served to tear Lily down, that which transpires over the course of The Next One to Fall is what builds her back up, and in that sense, this book is as much an origin story as it is a mystery.
Forge, February 2012
Rating: 9/10
Travel writer Lily Moore and her best friend, photographer Jesse Robb, traveled to Peru to see the sights, hike the Inca Trail, and shake off the dark cloud that’s been trailing Lily ever since tragedy rocked her world just three months prior. It seems a carefree vacation is not the cards for the pair, however, for when they reach Machu Picchu, they happen across a woman clinging to life in the ruins. Jesse runs to get help, but the woman’s beyond saving, and before she passes, she tells Lily the name of her killer and implores her to share this information with the police.
The local authorities conduct a brief investigation and ultimately rule the death an accident, but Lily’s convinced there’s more to the story. Jesse begs her to let the matter drop, but Lily refuses, and before long, the two find themselves ensnared in a web the likes of which they may never escape – a web of violence, lies, money, and murder.
The Next One to Fall is the sequel to author Hilary Davidson’s stellar debut, The Damage Done, and it’s quite simply a fantastic read. Equal parts action-adventure thriller and classic paranoia tale (with a touch of Peruvian travelogue thrown in for good measure), Davidson’s latest is an intelligent, atmospheric, heart-stopping tour-de-force, guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat. The prose is graceful, the pace is electric, and the mystery will keep you guessing until the very end.
The book has a timeless quality to it that, when coupled with the exotic locale and the story’s quiet air of menace, puts me in mind of Katherine Neville’s The Eight, and Davidson’s plot is positively Hitchcockian; rife with staircases, trains, mistaken identities, and charming sociopaths, everybody’s lying about something and everyone’s got an agenda, making it impossible for Lily (or the reader) to determine who – if anyone – can be trusted.
What I find most impressive about this book, though, is the way Davidson uses the fact of the mystery, itself, as a plot device. The Lily we meet at the start of this book is a ghost of her former self; unable to come to grips with all that’s happened to her, she’s drifting through life on autopilot, keeping everything and everyone at arm’s length. But while the events of The Damage Done served to tear Lily down, that which transpires over the course of The Next One to Fall is what builds her back up, and in that sense, this book is as much an origin story as it is a mystery.
REVIEW: You Might as Well Die
You Might as Well Die by J.J. Murphy
Berkley Prime Crime, December 2011 (304 pages)
Rating: 9
Everyone’s shocked when decidedly mediocre illustrator Ernie MacGuffin slips a suicide note into Dorothy Parker’s purse and takes a leap off the Brooklyn Bridge; MacGuffin may not have been a successful artist, but at least he was a happy one. Perhaps even more surprising than the man’s death, however, is his posthumous success: as soon as the news of his suicide hits the wire, his work triples in value and the editor of The New Yorker wants Dorothy and fellow Algonquin Round Table member Robert Benchley to write an article about MacGuffin for their inaugural issue.
The pair accepts the assignment, but the more they look into MacGuffin’s life, the stranger they find the circumstances surrounding his death. For example, the market is now being flooded with new MacGuffin originals, but where are they all coming from? Why isn’t MacGuffin’s widow more grief-stricken? And what’s with the mysterious clairvoyant who’s holding nightly séances in order to communicate with MacGuffin’s spirit?
You Might as Well Die is the follow-up to author J. J. Murphy’s stellar first Algonquin Round Table Mystery, Murder Your Darlings. I’ll admit, this book made me nervous. I mean, I flat-out adored Murder Your Darlings; what if Murphy was unable to capture lighting in a bottle a second time? It turns out I worried for naught, though; You Might as Well Die is a madcap tale of murder, lies, mystery, and intrigue, with some bootleg gin thrown in for good measure, and it doesn’t disappoint. (Think Dashiell Hammett’s The Thin Man meets—well, any of P.G. Wodehouse’s Jeeves & Wooster novels, and you’ve got the picture.) Murphy’s prose is witty and graceful, his imagery is striking, and his story positively drips with atmosphere. The mystery is cleverly plotted, and though I both anticipated Murphy’s plot twist and correctly guessed the identity of his killer, the ride was no less enjoyable for it. And while we don’t get to spend quite as much of this book lunching with the Vicious Circle or drinking in Tony Soma’s speakeasy as I might have liked, getting to watch Alexander Woollcott and Harpo Marx wreak havoc on the streets of New York with their own unique brand of extreme croquet and witnessing Houdini perform the halftime show of the very first NFL game ever played fills the void quite nicely.
The humor in this second Algonquin Round Table Mystery is less Dorothy Parker than it is “Who’s on first?”-era Abbott & Costello, but Murphy prevents things from becoming too vaudevillian by tackling some heavier issues than you might expect to find in a traditional mystery. From discussions of suicide to lonely moments spent in the special hell that is unrequited love, Murphy knows exactly when to undercut a serious scene with humor and when to just let that moment be, and he does so here with grace and aplomb.
And then, of course, there’s Dorothy Parker. In my review of Murder Your Darlings, I complimented Murphy on the way he managed to humanize Parker without diminishing her, and with You Might as Well Die, that compliment still stands. Murphy paints Parker as equal parts caustic and insecure. Readers are just as likely to identify with her as they are to sit in awe of her, and in my mind, you can’t hope for much more from a heroine.
The best books don’t merely entertain, they transport, and in You Might as Well Die, J.J. Murphy has created a time machine you’ll want to fire up again and again.
Berkley Prime Crime, December 2011 (304 pages)
Rating: 9
Everyone’s shocked when decidedly mediocre illustrator Ernie MacGuffin slips a suicide note into Dorothy Parker’s purse and takes a leap off the Brooklyn Bridge; MacGuffin may not have been a successful artist, but at least he was a happy one. Perhaps even more surprising than the man’s death, however, is his posthumous success: as soon as the news of his suicide hits the wire, his work triples in value and the editor of The New Yorker wants Dorothy and fellow Algonquin Round Table member Robert Benchley to write an article about MacGuffin for their inaugural issue.
The pair accepts the assignment, but the more they look into MacGuffin’s life, the stranger they find the circumstances surrounding his death. For example, the market is now being flooded with new MacGuffin originals, but where are they all coming from? Why isn’t MacGuffin’s widow more grief-stricken? And what’s with the mysterious clairvoyant who’s holding nightly séances in order to communicate with MacGuffin’s spirit?
You Might as Well Die is the follow-up to author J. J. Murphy’s stellar first Algonquin Round Table Mystery, Murder Your Darlings. I’ll admit, this book made me nervous. I mean, I flat-out adored Murder Your Darlings; what if Murphy was unable to capture lighting in a bottle a second time? It turns out I worried for naught, though; You Might as Well Die is a madcap tale of murder, lies, mystery, and intrigue, with some bootleg gin thrown in for good measure, and it doesn’t disappoint. (Think Dashiell Hammett’s The Thin Man meets—well, any of P.G. Wodehouse’s Jeeves & Wooster novels, and you’ve got the picture.) Murphy’s prose is witty and graceful, his imagery is striking, and his story positively drips with atmosphere. The mystery is cleverly plotted, and though I both anticipated Murphy’s plot twist and correctly guessed the identity of his killer, the ride was no less enjoyable for it. And while we don’t get to spend quite as much of this book lunching with the Vicious Circle or drinking in Tony Soma’s speakeasy as I might have liked, getting to watch Alexander Woollcott and Harpo Marx wreak havoc on the streets of New York with their own unique brand of extreme croquet and witnessing Houdini perform the halftime show of the very first NFL game ever played fills the void quite nicely.
The humor in this second Algonquin Round Table Mystery is less Dorothy Parker than it is “Who’s on first?”-era Abbott & Costello, but Murphy prevents things from becoming too vaudevillian by tackling some heavier issues than you might expect to find in a traditional mystery. From discussions of suicide to lonely moments spent in the special hell that is unrequited love, Murphy knows exactly when to undercut a serious scene with humor and when to just let that moment be, and he does so here with grace and aplomb.
And then, of course, there’s Dorothy Parker. In my review of Murder Your Darlings, I complimented Murphy on the way he managed to humanize Parker without diminishing her, and with You Might as Well Die, that compliment still stands. Murphy paints Parker as equal parts caustic and insecure. Readers are just as likely to identify with her as they are to sit in awe of her, and in my mind, you can’t hope for much more from a heroine.
The best books don’t merely entertain, they transport, and in You Might as Well Die, J.J. Murphy has created a time machine you’ll want to fire up again and again.
REVIEW: Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure
Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure by Diane Kelly
St. Martin’s, November 2011 (368 pages)
Rating: 9
For fans of: Susan Isaacs
Tara Holloway hasn’t seen a dull moment since starting work for the Treasury Department’s Criminal Investigations Division. She used to spend her days pushing paper in a tiny cubicle, but her new career has her carrying a badge, wielding a gun, and conducting investigations in the field. She’s even been tasked with helping the DEA bust an ice cream man who’s selling a lot more than popsicles to the neighborhood children (drug money’s taxable, dontcha know).
Her love life’s gotten more interesting too, thanks to a burgeoning romance with hunky landscape architect Brett Ellington. But just as things are starting to heat up for the couple, Tara uncovers a link between Brett and a suspected Ponzi scheme operator that causes her to slam on the brakes. Are the ties between the men mere coincidence, or does Tara not know her boyfriend as well as she thinks she does? Can she date someone she’s investigating? Can she investigate someone she’s dating? Ah, the perils of mixing business with pleasure…
Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure is the first of author Diane Kelly’s Tara Holloway Novels. I confess, I worried whether any book with an IRS agent for a protagonist and the word “taxes” in the title could keep me entertained for 368 pages, but Kelly defies expectation with this smart, sexy debut. Her prose is witty and stylish. Her mystery is seamlessly constructed, and includes just enough banking and finance information to inform the story, but not so much as to bore or confuse the reader. And for those of you who like a little sizzle with your intrigue, well – let’s just say there’s a reason this book garnered Kelly an award from the Romance Writers of America. The story is a bit of a slow burn, as Kelly definitely takes her time setting the scene and moving her pieces into place, but the narrative drive is strong, and like a good game of Mouse Trap, the payoff is well-worth the wait.
When I started this book, I wondered if perhaps its characters would be its downfall; to a one, they’re bold and brash and larger than life. Now, don’t get me wrong – big is better than boring, and I’d take a caricature over a piece of cardboard any day of the week. But when an entire cast is turned up to eleven, it can be exhausting to try and spend the length of an entire novel in their company.
Thankfully, however, in fiction as in real life, relationships inform character, and Kelly’s characters’ relationships are their saving grace. Case in point: Tara, our heroine, is introduced to us as a sharp-shooting, ass-kicking country girl by day, and a merlot-sipping, stiletto-sporting, semi-sex-obsessed woman by night. She’s irreverent and entertaining, yes, but a little too self-consciously so – like maybe she’s trying too hard to make us notice her or something. (Who the hell puts maraschino cherries in their red wine?) This hyper-color version of Tara is just a first impression, though; as soon as she starts interacting with her fellow castmates, her true colors shine through. From her unlikely friendship with "Latina Barbie" DEA Agent Christina Marquez to her schizophrenic romance with mysterious boyfriend Brett, Tara’s relationships serve to humanize her, the end result being a charming, likable, and thoroughly unique protagonist.
Looking for a fun new read? Check out Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure by Diane Kelly. Part romance, part thriller, and part comedic mysery, it's just the thing to help keep you warm on a chilly autumn night.
St. Martin’s, November 2011 (368 pages)
Rating: 9
For fans of: Susan Isaacs
Tara Holloway hasn’t seen a dull moment since starting work for the Treasury Department’s Criminal Investigations Division. She used to spend her days pushing paper in a tiny cubicle, but her new career has her carrying a badge, wielding a gun, and conducting investigations in the field. She’s even been tasked with helping the DEA bust an ice cream man who’s selling a lot more than popsicles to the neighborhood children (drug money’s taxable, dontcha know).
Her love life’s gotten more interesting too, thanks to a burgeoning romance with hunky landscape architect Brett Ellington. But just as things are starting to heat up for the couple, Tara uncovers a link between Brett and a suspected Ponzi scheme operator that causes her to slam on the brakes. Are the ties between the men mere coincidence, or does Tara not know her boyfriend as well as she thinks she does? Can she date someone she’s investigating? Can she investigate someone she’s dating? Ah, the perils of mixing business with pleasure…
Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure is the first of author Diane Kelly’s Tara Holloway Novels. I confess, I worried whether any book with an IRS agent for a protagonist and the word “taxes” in the title could keep me entertained for 368 pages, but Kelly defies expectation with this smart, sexy debut. Her prose is witty and stylish. Her mystery is seamlessly constructed, and includes just enough banking and finance information to inform the story, but not so much as to bore or confuse the reader. And for those of you who like a little sizzle with your intrigue, well – let’s just say there’s a reason this book garnered Kelly an award from the Romance Writers of America. The story is a bit of a slow burn, as Kelly definitely takes her time setting the scene and moving her pieces into place, but the narrative drive is strong, and like a good game of Mouse Trap, the payoff is well-worth the wait.
When I started this book, I wondered if perhaps its characters would be its downfall; to a one, they’re bold and brash and larger than life. Now, don’t get me wrong – big is better than boring, and I’d take a caricature over a piece of cardboard any day of the week. But when an entire cast is turned up to eleven, it can be exhausting to try and spend the length of an entire novel in their company.
Thankfully, however, in fiction as in real life, relationships inform character, and Kelly’s characters’ relationships are their saving grace. Case in point: Tara, our heroine, is introduced to us as a sharp-shooting, ass-kicking country girl by day, and a merlot-sipping, stiletto-sporting, semi-sex-obsessed woman by night. She’s irreverent and entertaining, yes, but a little too self-consciously so – like maybe she’s trying too hard to make us notice her or something. (Who the hell puts maraschino cherries in their red wine?) This hyper-color version of Tara is just a first impression, though; as soon as she starts interacting with her fellow castmates, her true colors shine through. From her unlikely friendship with "Latina Barbie" DEA Agent Christina Marquez to her schizophrenic romance with mysterious boyfriend Brett, Tara’s relationships serve to humanize her, the end result being a charming, likable, and thoroughly unique protagonist.
Looking for a fun new read? Check out Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure by Diane Kelly. Part romance, part thriller, and part comedic mysery, it's just the thing to help keep you warm on a chilly autumn night.
REVIEW: Skating Over the Line
Skating Over the Line by Joelle Charbonneau
Minotaur Books, September 2011
Rating: 8
It’s a dream come true for Rebecca Robbins: someone finally wants to buy the Toe Stop roller rink. She should be overjoyed at the prospect of selling the business she inherited from her mother; after all, it’s the only thing keeping her in the tiny berg of Indian Falls, Illinois – especially now that her no-account flim-flam artist of a father has returned to town. So why is she so hesitant to start packing her bags?
Before she can dwell too long on that question, though, another mystery drops into her lap. It seems someone in Indian Falls has developed a penchant for stealing old cars – and then setting them on fire. Though her grandfather and the gang down at the Senior Center want Rebecca to use her sleuthing skills to catch the criminal, the local sheriff’s department is none too keen on the idea of her nosing around yet another of their investigations. But then some mysterious strangers start lurking around the rink and threatening the lives of her friends and family, and Rebecca comes to the realization that there's no way she can sit this one out.
Skating Over the Line is the second installment in Joelle Charbonneau’s Rebecca Robbins Mystery series. Given that the book’s cast includes an elderly Elvis impersonator and a hat-wearing camel, you might think that Charbonneau’s latest is all slapstick and no substance. You’d be wrong. Yes, Skating Over the Line is a comedy with more laugh lines than you can shake a jar of wrinkle cream at, but it also has plenty of heart.
Rebecca is a sassy, determined heroine for whom readers will want to root. Not only is she an intrepid amateur sleuth and a doting granddaughter, but as we learn with the introduction of her father, she’s also a girl with some serious abandonment issues. The scenes Rebecca shares with her father have surprising emotional resonance and shed a nice light on the choices she’s made in life (romantic and otherwise), giving her character a depth the likes of which you don’t often find in a cozy. Though Charbonneau’s no slouch at penning punch lines, I think her true talent may lie in writing sucker punches, and I, for one, hope we see more of this from her in books to come.
Rebecca’s somewhat stunted romance with the handsome-yet-patronizing Lionel Franklin is entertaining enough, but the most intriguing relationship here is the one between Charbonneau’s leading lady and cantankerous sheriff’s deputy Sean Holmes. Holmes’ interactions with Rebecca are suffused with the sort of smoldering chemistry that can only come from a good love-hate relationship, and I sincerely hope to see the pair thrown together more often in the future.
The rest of the cast is entertaining as well, comprised almost entirely of the sort of larger-than-life characters you’d find in a Maddy Hunter novel. Randy septuagenarians, spandex-clad roller-skating instructors, and sexually frustrated former strippers, the little town of Indian Falls has more color than your average double rainbow.
I confess I found the book’s mystery to be a tad predictable (I had the killer pegged from early on), but the pace is quick and the plot is fun, making this flaw easy to forgive. Looking for a light, fun small-town cozy to scratch that Joanne Fluke itch? Search no further than Skating Over the Line by Joelle Charbonneau.
Minotaur Books, September 2011
Rating: 8
It’s a dream come true for Rebecca Robbins: someone finally wants to buy the Toe Stop roller rink. She should be overjoyed at the prospect of selling the business she inherited from her mother; after all, it’s the only thing keeping her in the tiny berg of Indian Falls, Illinois – especially now that her no-account flim-flam artist of a father has returned to town. So why is she so hesitant to start packing her bags?
Before she can dwell too long on that question, though, another mystery drops into her lap. It seems someone in Indian Falls has developed a penchant for stealing old cars – and then setting them on fire. Though her grandfather and the gang down at the Senior Center want Rebecca to use her sleuthing skills to catch the criminal, the local sheriff’s department is none too keen on the idea of her nosing around yet another of their investigations. But then some mysterious strangers start lurking around the rink and threatening the lives of her friends and family, and Rebecca comes to the realization that there's no way she can sit this one out.
Skating Over the Line is the second installment in Joelle Charbonneau’s Rebecca Robbins Mystery series. Given that the book’s cast includes an elderly Elvis impersonator and a hat-wearing camel, you might think that Charbonneau’s latest is all slapstick and no substance. You’d be wrong. Yes, Skating Over the Line is a comedy with more laugh lines than you can shake a jar of wrinkle cream at, but it also has plenty of heart.
Rebecca is a sassy, determined heroine for whom readers will want to root. Not only is she an intrepid amateur sleuth and a doting granddaughter, but as we learn with the introduction of her father, she’s also a girl with some serious abandonment issues. The scenes Rebecca shares with her father have surprising emotional resonance and shed a nice light on the choices she’s made in life (romantic and otherwise), giving her character a depth the likes of which you don’t often find in a cozy. Though Charbonneau’s no slouch at penning punch lines, I think her true talent may lie in writing sucker punches, and I, for one, hope we see more of this from her in books to come.
Rebecca’s somewhat stunted romance with the handsome-yet-patronizing Lionel Franklin is entertaining enough, but the most intriguing relationship here is the one between Charbonneau’s leading lady and cantankerous sheriff’s deputy Sean Holmes. Holmes’ interactions with Rebecca are suffused with the sort of smoldering chemistry that can only come from a good love-hate relationship, and I sincerely hope to see the pair thrown together more often in the future.
The rest of the cast is entertaining as well, comprised almost entirely of the sort of larger-than-life characters you’d find in a Maddy Hunter novel. Randy septuagenarians, spandex-clad roller-skating instructors, and sexually frustrated former strippers, the little town of Indian Falls has more color than your average double rainbow.
I confess I found the book’s mystery to be a tad predictable (I had the killer pegged from early on), but the pace is quick and the plot is fun, making this flaw easy to forgive. Looking for a light, fun small-town cozy to scratch that Joanne Fluke itch? Search no further than Skating Over the Line by Joelle Charbonneau.
REVIEW: Night of the Living Deed
Night of the Living Deed by E.J. Copperman
Berkley, June 2010
Rating: 10
When Alison Kerby and her young daughter, Melissa, buy a rambling old house on the Jersey Shore and start making plans to turn the place into a guesthouse, they don't expect to have lodgers before the renovations are even complete. They also don't expect for those lodgers to be ghosts. As it turns out, the house is haunted by the spirits of Maxie Malone and Paul Harrison -- the house's previous owner and the private investigator she hired to discover who was sending her anonymous threats. The pair's deaths were initially ruled a double suicide, but Alison's determined to get the investigation re-opened -- particularly since Paul and Maxie refuse to leave her alone and let her finish her renovations until their murderer is brought to justice. But when Alison starts receiving threatening messages herself, she's forced to wonder: will she solve the case in time to avoid becoming the house's newest ghostly guest?
Night of the Living Deed is the first in E. J. Copperman's new Haunted Guesthouse Mystery series. It's Topper meets Beetlejuice with a dash of This Old House thrown in for good measure, and it's one of the best mysteries I've read this year.
The prose starts out a little clunky, but Copperman quickly finds Alison's voice, and when he does, the book just comes alive. The plot is tight, the narration is propulsive, and the mystery is clever and kept me guessing until the very end. The list of suspects is long, but not too, and Copperman drops clues in all the right places. The pacing is perfect, the dialogue is witty and natural, and the book is quite simply a pleasure to read from start to finish.
Alison is a smart, strong, independent single mother who makes for a fabulous amateur sleuth and a winsome heroine. Melissa is neither precious or precocious and actually makes for a remarkably good sidekick, and Maxie and Paul may be ghosts, but they're two of the best supporting characters I've ever read. Petulant poltergeist-with-a-heart-of-gold Maxie is characterization at its finest; simultaneously hilarious and charming, her antics and snarky banter will keep you roaring, and the sweet relationship she shares with Melissa will warm your heart. And for his part, ghostly P. I. Paul is a nice twist on the star-crossed love interest (a concept I expect Copperman will have a great deal of fun exploring in later books) and is the perfect impetus to get Alison involved in this and future investigations. He's sweet, charming, and doggedly persistent, and is hands-down a more compelling disembodied detective than Alice Kimberly's Jack Shepard.
With Night of the Living Deed, E. J. Copperman has created a haunted guesthouse that just begs for an extended stay. What are you waiting for? Run out (right now!) and buy yourself a copy; you can thank me later.
*Note: I purchased this book with my own money; it was not provided to me by the author or his publisher.
Berkley, June 2010
Rating: 10
When Alison Kerby and her young daughter, Melissa, buy a rambling old house on the Jersey Shore and start making plans to turn the place into a guesthouse, they don't expect to have lodgers before the renovations are even complete. They also don't expect for those lodgers to be ghosts. As it turns out, the house is haunted by the spirits of Maxie Malone and Paul Harrison -- the house's previous owner and the private investigator she hired to discover who was sending her anonymous threats. The pair's deaths were initially ruled a double suicide, but Alison's determined to get the investigation re-opened -- particularly since Paul and Maxie refuse to leave her alone and let her finish her renovations until their murderer is brought to justice. But when Alison starts receiving threatening messages herself, she's forced to wonder: will she solve the case in time to avoid becoming the house's newest ghostly guest?
Night of the Living Deed is the first in E. J. Copperman's new Haunted Guesthouse Mystery series. It's Topper meets Beetlejuice with a dash of This Old House thrown in for good measure, and it's one of the best mysteries I've read this year.
The prose starts out a little clunky, but Copperman quickly finds Alison's voice, and when he does, the book just comes alive. The plot is tight, the narration is propulsive, and the mystery is clever and kept me guessing until the very end. The list of suspects is long, but not too, and Copperman drops clues in all the right places. The pacing is perfect, the dialogue is witty and natural, and the book is quite simply a pleasure to read from start to finish.
Alison is a smart, strong, independent single mother who makes for a fabulous amateur sleuth and a winsome heroine. Melissa is neither precious or precocious and actually makes for a remarkably good sidekick, and Maxie and Paul may be ghosts, but they're two of the best supporting characters I've ever read. Petulant poltergeist-with-a-heart-of-gold Maxie is characterization at its finest; simultaneously hilarious and charming, her antics and snarky banter will keep you roaring, and the sweet relationship she shares with Melissa will warm your heart. And for his part, ghostly P. I. Paul is a nice twist on the star-crossed love interest (a concept I expect Copperman will have a great deal of fun exploring in later books) and is the perfect impetus to get Alison involved in this and future investigations. He's sweet, charming, and doggedly persistent, and is hands-down a more compelling disembodied detective than Alice Kimberly's Jack Shepard.
With Night of the Living Deed, E. J. Copperman has created a haunted guesthouse that just begs for an extended stay. What are you waiting for? Run out (right now!) and buy yourself a copy; you can thank me later.
*Note: I purchased this book with my own money; it was not provided to me by the author or his publisher.