Mini-Reviews #8…
[Note from Steve: Two different books that are additions to series for your reading enjoyment, but with two different results…]
Ashes. Kelly Cozy, author. First book in a series. (Smite, 2013, 978-0-9851234-5-1) The obvious pseudonym is misleading. This isn’t a cozy mystery. It’s not even a mystery. It’s a thriller, at least half of it—the other half reads like the clinical records of a mental patient.
The story begins when Jennifer Thomson becomes the last of a dozen or so survivors of a terrorist attack. She works in an office building in LA filled with federal workers. She survives because she needs a copier. The only functioning one is on the other side of the building from her cubicle, the side that remains standing long enough for to find her way down the stairs and out of the building before the whole thing collapses. This is a copy of the 9/11 disaster, of course. She develops PTSD, wondering why she survived while others didn’t. It doesn’t help that some relatives of victims blame her for surviving too.
Sean Kincaid, a forced retiree from a Black Ops program, sees the picture of Jennifer as she’s carried out of the building and decides to do her a favor: find the person responsible and let her pass judgement on him for closure. His boy-scout deed isn’t simple to pull off. The U.S. government has blamed jihadists and wants to keep the public thinking that way, rather than admit that those responsible are homegrown fanatics. This is a copy of the Oklahoma City disaster, of course, but in that case the government was up front about everything—you have to have that evil government conspiracy, right?
The whole mess is preposterous, albeit entertaining reading at times. You’ll feel like a ping pong ball, though, as the author jumps between Jennifer’s path to mental health (tiresome) and Sean’s spiral down into Black Ops irrelevancy (he should have learned to play golf).
This book has too much narrative, inner soul-searching, neediness, and schmaltzy yet platonic romance. I found myself skipping a lot, but I still didn’t miss anything—that says something. The most interesting characters are Robert, Sean’s ex-colleague, who has retired to Maine before Sean went to Florida; and the old librarian, and ex-priest who befriends Jennifer. Worst of all, this book ends with a cliffhanger, a mortal sin. Somehow this author thinks that’s what “series” means. Novels in series need to be complete stories. The scriptwriters of Dallas might love Ms. Cozy, but I just felt swindled.
Just the Pits. Jinx Schwartz, author. (2013) #5 in the Hetta Coffey series. I put this book in the category of Carolyn J. Rose and Mike Nettleton’s The Big Grabowski, Sometimes a Great Commotion, and The Hard Karma Shuffle; or, for those mostly addicted to Big Five books, some of Carl Hiaasen’s funniest mysteries and thrillers. In other words, this book is a fantastic and funny mystery/thriller. Hetta, an ex-Texan full of wonderful, irascible, and irreverent attitude, is a consultant who’s supposed to determine how cost overruns for a Baja, CA mining firm originate. She has a penchant for getting into trouble and does so in this book.
The crime, and the criminals to a certain extent, aren’t earth-shaking—there are no meaty social themes here. In fact, there are only smiles as the reader enjoys some outlandish characters bent on proving that human beings do weird and comical things. Hetta and her friends and acquaintances are larger than life in many of their actions and attitudes (most people aren’t that funny), and the bad guys in real life generally aren’t so comical either. But who cares? This was an entertaining read that kept me laughing. Lots of great metaphors and plays on words too. This could be a lesson on how to write comedy mysteries.
In addition, unlike the author above, Ms. Schwartz doesn’t bludgeon her readers with a cliffhanger at the end. She knows what “series” means: we have a complete, funny story, with climax and denouement. The epilog is a wee bit rushed, and I’m still not sure where the $7 M ended up, but this book does what it was clearly intended to do. Applause for Ms. Schwartz!
***
[Coming soon, Kindle Countdown Deal #2: Teeter-Totter between Lust and Murder, #3 in the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco,” will be on sale from July 1 through July 7, at $0.99, reduced from $2.99. Does Chen commit murder? The long answer is surprising. If you missed the first deal, don’t miss this one.]
In elibris libertas….
