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3.43 AVERAGE
3.43 AVERAGE
So I've read two books each of Joan Hess's Claire Malloy and Arly Hanks series and it's been rated the same each time. I guess her style just isn't for me. This one started out all right but then it took a slog through a boggy middle. It doesn't help that I find Claire arrogant and irritating and her daughter, Caron to be such an over the top teen whiner.
It starts when Claire sees a rat in her apartment and a well to do friend, Dolly, asks her to house sit while she's out of town so Claire packs up Caron and Caron's best friend, Inez and they move in for a little while to enjoy the pool, Jacuzzi and other rat-free immensities. Almost immediately two young women, Sara Louise and Madison show up to see ‘aunt Dolly’ and ask to stay because their car is having trouble and they have nowhere else to do. And Caron and Inez find a dead body out by the pool.
The body disappears a few times before it finally turns up in the freezer and Madison goes missing. Claire of course has to investigate while juggling her whiny daughter, her bookstore (which she’s in so rarely I don’t know how she hasn’t lost it and gone bankrupt), her cop boyfriend, Peter, and some newcomers, an older couple Lucy and Daniel who keep trying to set her up with someone else out at the ritzy country club townhouses, the handsome Gary, not to mention the slew of pool cleaners, maids and delivery guys popping in and out of the home.
It takes Claire almost half the novel before she truly starts investigating but that doesn’t stop the chief of police, the mayor and some other city council people to be screaming for her head (which makes NO sense in the context of this story because all she did was find the body. I get that this is book 15 or so and there’s a history but still it doesn’t fit this story). There really isn’t a reason for Claire to investigate really because boyfriend, Peter is on the case but she doesn’t trust him to do it. This, in fact, was problematic for me because it came across as she thought she was smarter and better at Peter’s job than he was. She never once acted in love with this guy. He seemed more like a prop for her.
Other things that just didn’t work for me was that she talked about details of the case including where she thought Dolly might have been with everyone even after it was obvious the killer was looking for her. Almost complete strangers including Daniel, Gary, Lucy, the pool guys, the delivery dude, didn’t matter. She wasn’t questioning them, just spilling the details.
And then there’s Caron and Inez. What sort of person leaves their kid in the line of fire? She never once truly attempts to get Caron out of the way even after Sara Louise was attacked at the house or the body was found or she knows someone is tearing up places looking for something Dolly might have. And what of Inez? I know she has parents. They never figure into this story. If it was you wouldn’t you run there and grab your child out of that house?
Never once did it occur to her that the delivery guy was hinky. When was the last time a delivery man, barring a furniture/heavy appliance guy ever come into your house and sit down for drinks and talk for twenty minutes? Even after she learns certain characters are weird and she should tell Peter she doesn’t do it right away.
Will I read another? I suppose if I do the literary destinations challenge and I need Arkansas again but I’m in no hurry.
It starts when Claire sees a rat in her apartment and a well to do friend, Dolly, asks her to house sit while she's out of town so Claire packs up Caron and Caron's best friend, Inez and they move in for a little while to enjoy the pool, Jacuzzi and other rat-free immensities. Almost immediately two young women, Sara Louise and Madison show up to see ‘aunt Dolly’ and ask to stay because their car is having trouble and they have nowhere else to do. And Caron and Inez find a dead body out by the pool.
The body disappears a few times before it finally turns up in the freezer and Madison goes missing. Claire of course has to investigate while juggling her whiny daughter, her bookstore (which she’s in so rarely I don’t know how she hasn’t lost it and gone bankrupt), her cop boyfriend, Peter, and some newcomers, an older couple Lucy and Daniel who keep trying to set her up with someone else out at the ritzy country club townhouses, the handsome Gary, not to mention the slew of pool cleaners, maids and delivery guys popping in and out of the home.
It takes Claire almost half the novel before she truly starts investigating but that doesn’t stop the chief of police, the mayor and some other city council people to be screaming for her head (which makes NO sense in the context of this story because all she did was find the body. I get that this is book 15 or so and there’s a history but still it doesn’t fit this story). There really isn’t a reason for Claire to investigate really because boyfriend, Peter is on the case but she doesn’t trust him to do it. This, in fact, was problematic for me because it came across as she thought she was smarter and better at Peter’s job than he was. She never once acted in love with this guy. He seemed more like a prop for her.
Other things that just didn’t work for me was that she talked about details of the case including where she thought Dolly might have been with everyone even after it was obvious the killer was looking for her. Almost complete strangers including Daniel, Gary, Lucy, the pool guys, the delivery dude, didn’t matter. She wasn’t questioning them, just spilling the details.
And then there’s Caron and Inez. What sort of person leaves their kid in the line of fire? She never once truly attempts to get Caron out of the way even after Sara Louise was attacked at the house or the body was found or she knows someone is tearing up places looking for something Dolly might have. And what of Inez? I know she has parents. They never figure into this story. If it was you wouldn’t you run there and grab your child out of that house?
Never once did it occur to her that the delivery guy was hinky. When was the last time a delivery man, barring a furniture/heavy appliance guy ever come into your house and sit down for drinks and talk for twenty minutes? Even after she learns certain characters are weird and she should tell Peter she doesn’t do it right away.
Will I read another? I suppose if I do the literary destinations challenge and I need Arkansas again but I’m in no hurry.
mysterious
One I had not read before. Fun, even if most of the victims and perps are "not from around here." And though Claire does inevitably end up in danger ... this time it was not because of a decision she'd made to go to a dangerous place. The danger came to her.