Sara E. James

Glad I tried again

Revisado: 08-08-22

The first time I tried to listen to this, it didn't grab me in the first ten minutes or less. I finally decided to come back to it a few days ago and I'm glad I did. Although there were some places where I got frustrated by what I saw as contrivance to keep the characters from progressing in their relationship, I mostly really enjoyed the journey and rooted hard for the couple to get all the answers they needed and finally get together. Kal and Vera were super cute together and I hope for a few glimpses of them in the rest of the series.

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Depressing environmental scare porn

Revisado: 06-26-22

I didn't even get past the first 10 minutes. I get it, the earth's future is dire. We should all recycle and ban fossil fuels so we don't end up like these people. I wanted a story, not a ham-fisted attempt to scare people into doing more to combat global warming.

The father was a selfish jerk to commit suicide and leave his family without his much-needed income. Who has a sauna if the world is barely livable because it's so hot? Dumb. The mother wasn't much better. I heard nothing to make me want to spend even an hour of my time on the rest of this. I like the narrator, so it's not her fault. I'd listen to her again.

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Entertaining, kept me guessing for the most part

Revisado: 04-16-22

Some of the reviews are quite critical, and I don't feel the story deserves them. There are perhaps some pacing issues, which I attribute to this being not a straightforward procedural mystery, but an attempt to be a bit literary as well as a mystery.

The main character, Kate, is not some amateur sleuth, so at the point in other mysteries when one would expect the main character to do some actual investigating, she doesn't do that. This was at times frustrating, but it seemed clear to me that the author wanted to portray grief and conflicted loyalties in a realistic manner, rather than follow a formula of a main character doggedly investigating something moments after a traumatic experience as some books seem to go.

While I could look back and say that some of the twists were predictable, they were and they weren't. I considered many possibilities for the various mysteries in this story, and the fact that some of my theories were right doesn't mean I had certainty while reading that I was on the right track. There were plenty of plausible things to consider that I couldn't put together until 3/4 in, and then I still wasn't certain I knew how it would turn out.

Yes, there were a few times when Kate didn't act as I thought a reasonable person would in that circumstance, but others might disagree. I think our judgments of a character's actions are subjective and personal. Nothing was outside the realm of possibility, even if not the logical choice.

There was one question I still had at the end that wasn't addressed, and this was the one thing that felt like an oversight, so it does make me wonder if I missed a small detail since I was listening rather than seeing the words on a page, which I tend to retain better. Stop here if you don't want to know, but I'll try to be vague for those reading this before finishing.

*** I didn't understand why, when two bodies were buried in the same spot by two parties at two different times, the second party didn't say or do anything about finding the first body when they buried the second. Why didn't they question someone that logically they had to think knew the first body was there? Even given their own circumstances of needing to hide a body, this didn't make sense, and even less so that once all was revealed, that the other characters didn't question this. So I wonder if the bodies were NOT in the same exact spot even though they were found by police at the same time? However, it sounded as if they were in the same grave. Maybe I missed something.

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"It's like he's trying to speak to me, I know it!"

Revisado: 10-24-21

Marlin in Finding Nemo expresses my thoughts about this story pretty well. I guess it's a metaphor for something, this story, but I'm not sure what. If you can't make the reader understand your metaphor, then your attempt at making them think about something pretty much fails. Is it about society? Environmentalism? Misogyny? Who knows. The narrator was actually pretty good, considering what she had to work with. But I actually got so bored and annoyed with this attempt at a moralizing tale that I took weeks, months to listen to its entirety, and it's only 46 minutes long. And no, I don't think listening to all of it at once would have helped it make more sense. Maybe I just don't like a story whose real purpose seems to be to preach rather than tell a satisfying story.

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In some ways, a strange ending for the series

Revisado: 04-16-21

For this final book about Tom Reed and Walt Sydowski, I was pleased that I was actually able to clock the killer very early in the book, though Mofina did have me second guessing for a little while. This plot felt a little bit faster paced, more succinct than some of the others where I wished the story would just end already. But in some ways, it's a strange ending for the series.

Two of the previous books have heavily involved Tom Reed's wife and son as part of the plot. Given that this is the last book, their brief appearances and lack of importance to the plot are disappointing.

Poor Molly, as usual, can't win for losing. I found myself pitying her for having to be the inexplicably irresistible femme fatale in this series and especially this book. As some other reviewers said, it strains credulity a bit.

There is no mention of Walt's girlfriend. I think her name was Louise. I know they had their struggles in one of the previous books, but as far as I recalled, they were still together. She wasn't even mentioned in this book. I would have liked to see Walt settle down with her and retire at the end, and it's surprising that that isn't even considered.

Then there's an odd line about his cop partner Linda Turgin questioning her desire to continue being a cop that comes out of left field at the end, and obviously can't be explored further since Mofina didn't write any more books about them. Nothing in the book seemed to point to her having such a doubt. It's a disappointment of the overall series, too, that Linda is never really developed as a character.

I have to wonder whether Mofina planned this to be the last book, given it has no series wrap-up to it at all.

Still, I have to rate the series pretty highly overall. The stories were engaging and I was entertained. I prefer a little more development of the characters whose job it is to solve the mysteries than I sometimes got, but it is what it is. I'll check out the author's more recent works to see if his style has evolved.

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Dated, Slightly Frustrating, But Engaging

Revisado: 03-02-21

Although I haven't yet reviewed them, I've read the first two books in the Walt Sydowski (sp?) and Tom Reed series also. Although there are some hints in the first two books that this series is about twenty years old, this book feels the most dated of the three due to the importance computer technology plays in the case. Having friends on the internet is seen as a bit of an oddity and most police work doesn't revolve around the victims' online presence as one would expect to be possibly first priority today. However, despite the dated nature of the technology references, the case itself is interesting and well plotted.

The writer does seem to have a thing with villains who have bad theology as part of their psychosis, though. That gets a little old since there really aren't any characters who exhibit positive aspects of religious faith. It makes me wonder what the author's beef is with religion.

The most frustrating thing about this novel was Walt's unreasonable persistence in ignoring anything from Ben Wyatt, a new young cop in the department. It also felt a bit contrived that Wyatt didn't just spit out his information to literally anyone else in the department or in a written report left on Walt's desk, rather than let it continue to be ignored because of Walt's prejudice against him. If this was the first book I'd read about Walt, I would have hated him for being so close-minded and arrogant.

Tom Reed is also a bit frustrating as he continues his selfish ways of parenting and "husbanding" halfheartedly. You would think he would have done better considering what he's been through in past novels. I don't really know why Ann puts up with him.

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Hard to rate this one

Revisado: 07-23-20

I still don't know why this story is titled as it is. I realized that as I just finished.

This is a tough book to rate. It was entertaining in a lot of respects, but a few factors kept it from being a totally satisfying read.

I thought it was interesting that it was set during the current Covid-19 pandemic, and it feels kind of strange to read/listen to something that is set during a time that is still happening. And it is also impressive that it was written, recorded, and produced in such a short time frame. But perhaps that also led to some of the story's weaknesses, as you will see.

The performer was good, with sufficiently distinct voices. There was only one spot where I wasn't sure which character said a line and I went back a few seconds to figure it out. I did feel that the narrator perhaps added a tone to some lines of dialogue that weren't necessarily supported by the actual text but that was near the end of the story and with a new character. Perhaps there was some direction given to the performer to deliver them that way, I don't know.

I liked the story a lot until about the midpoint or slightly over the midpoint. The characters were engaging and I was invested in knowing the "truth" of the situation. There were some good twists to the story. The author managed to keep me guessing and trying to predict what would play out, and I felt sufficiently surprised by what unfolded. for the most part.

It did start to go a bit off the rails for me at the midpoint and then towards the end, in terms of the writing. Suddenly we were given a POV (point of view) scene of a character we hadn't had a POV of before. That could have added some tension, but the scene went from showing to telling, feeling like an information dump rather than the character's thoughts or rather than being shown the action unfolding in real time. I'm using some terminology that might be more familiar to writers than the average reader, but you'll see what I mean when you hear it.

This telling instead of showing seemed to happen a lot during the last half of the story, and it felt like maybe the writer did that to hurry up and finish the story or keep it within a certain length. But it weakened the storytelling and was not as engaging to listen to.

In terms of characters, Don is sometimes way too much of a babe in the woods for a 70 year old guy. This irritated me. He also strikes me as rather old for 70 compared to other 70 year olds I know. And the way he talked about how much of a scandal certain things were in his youth, you would have thought he was young in the 30s, not the 70s. Maybe Australia was more prudish in those days than the US.

She's introduced late, but I disliked Eileen. She seemed resentful of another character even in her old age, and that felt really distasteful given that character's circumstances. I was taken aback by her attitude. It made me think that another character must have taken after her. Again, you'll know who I mean if you read it.

Although the author tries to explain why Bailey acted as he did, even going to great lengths with all that info dumping to moralize and ponder about it, it doesn't make much sense. What a whiner and a jerk. I would like to slap him.

The ending was unsatisfying in how it dealt with one character, and it would have been a better story if that had been handled more justly.

Overall, I guess I'm not sorry I listened to it. But it probably should have had some more revising or something to eliminate so much telling of facts and to craft a more satisfying ending.

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Would enjoy more as an ebook

Revisado: 01-31-20 El oyente recibió este título gratis

I would describe this book as a fantasy, because it takes place in an imaginary country, but it lacks other elements common to fantasy, such as magic or non-human races. It takes place in an era that feels like an analogue to our world's medieval period, or some time pre-Industrial Revolution. So in the sense that it feels historical and yet is about invented countries, I would call it a historical fantasy. It's not quite alternate history, since it's not grounded in real-world geography.

I wish I had liked the narrator's performance more. I found her rather annoying to listen to. She does choose different voices for characters, but I didn't think this was very successful. The main issue was that her delivery didn't enhance the material, but rather detracted from it. She reminded me of the exaggerated emoting that voice actors will use for cartoon characters, rather than a natural way of speaking. Her intonation didn't help indicate the ends of sentences, making it confusing for me at times to process what I was hearing because I was expecting more sentence, or because a sentence would seem to be a run-on when it really wasn't.

The premise sounded intriguing – a young woman, Gwen, learns she is the heir to the throne, after being raised as a farmer. The story tackles some faith elements as Gwen, who hasn't paid much attention to religion growing up, now has to decide what she believes as the leader of her country. The narrative alternates between third person point of view in the present day when she is already queen, to first person point of view in Gwen's writing a memoir of her past. I was more interested in the current issues she faced as a young queen who has had no preparation for this role than in the memoir sections.

I usually prefer a story that is more immersive in style than this one. There wasn't enough sensory description for me to feel I was seeing it play out like a movie in my mind, versus being told the facts of what happened. I didn't feel like I could get in the characters' heads, and relate to their motives and feel what they were feeling.

While I'm glad for the opportunity to listen to this book, the narrator really wasn't for me, so I am not going to finish listening to this book, unfortunately. I would rather be able to read it at my own pace in text.

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Lost me at the "hero" calling her a b*tch.

Revisado: 12-11-19

Two people who can't stand each other agree to be each other's holiday dates and find out they like each other. Yes, we've seen this one before, but it's a plot I enjoy, so I thought I'd give this a try. Unfortunately, the hero isn't very likable and they lost me when he actually uttered the line "I knew there had to be more to you than being a b*itch." Sorry, even in jest, any man who said that to me would never be someone I'd fall in love with. Not interested in finishing this.

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esto le resultó útil a 1 persona

Well, I won't get those three hours back.

Revisado: 12-11-19

In some ways, the solution to the mystery was obvious from the start. But the twist that the author then put on that just made me wish I hadn't bothered listening to this. At least it was my free option for the month, I guess. Very unsatisfying ending.

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esto le resultó útil a 9 personas