Alas, this book was archived before I got chance to read it.

I enjoyed this murder mystery. This book has a good plot and action.

This was a brand new experience for me. Pretty interesting, but not in a good way. I’ve been reading ARCs (Advanced Reader Copy)for years. Before that, I beta read for several authors and was the first reader on a few new and unfinished manuscripts. The point is that I have seen a lot of books before they were ready for publication. I have never read anything quite this bad. I started to close this book several times and just forget it, but I became fascinated with the total sloppiness and wondered just how bad it could be. I also wanted to know if there was a story worth reading buried somewhere in the mess. There wasn’t. There were plot holes you could drive a truck through with characters that were flimsy. I wanted my readers to have a look at what we endure to find you the best books. Keep in mind that the vast majority of ARCs have a few, at worst, minor errors. Quite a few are flawless. This is an exception. A few examples…..

“The warm soak was heaven. Soothing heat penetrated her skin, loosening the tension throughout her body. Lids closed, she relaxed against the porcine.”

While discussing this with a few reviewer friends on a private page, one of them sent me this cartoon! I laughed my butt off! And, yes, I knew the author meant porcelain, but at this point it’s gotten past the author, a couple of beta readers and an editor. Unacceptable.

Just a few pages later was this gem.

“So I’ve been told,” Jack replied dryly. “I place the blame on my material unit’s nurturing skills.”

MOMMY!!!
Which brought this image to mind. And again I knew she meant maternal, but it has gotten past too many supposedly smart people at this point to be ignored. Sheesh. Edit your books!

And another interesting visual……

“The engine reared as it fought to climb the uneven terrine’s rough hills.”

Engines roar or rev, but I’ve only seen them “rear” in cartoons! Let’s just ignore the misspelling of “terrain”. There isn’t enough time or space to address spelling and grammar errors.

These phrases made me grind my teeth.

“She stared at after him as he vanished into the dawn’s dazzling glimmer.”

“She hugged him tighter as he rode her faster, harder, prompting her consciousness to waft.”

My high school English teachers, Mrs. Alford, Mrs. Gore and Mrs, Ogletree (I had one of them twice) would have humiliated me or any student for getting these next sentences wrong!

“Her elatedness from freedom dissolved into disappointment.”

“Katie stormed into Jules restaurant. Never had she gone from elatedness to fear to anger in such a short amount of time.”

“Elatedness” is a perfectly fine word when used as a noun. In the examples above, the word should have been “elation”. These types of errors are all over this book.

Finally, here is a single example of the most aggravating, annoying and distracting mistakes in this ARC…missing words, repeated words and words out-of-order.

“She feared she’d pass out if she stayed another here second.”

In summary, my advise to readers is to run, don’t walk, to your favorite reviewer and give her or him a big hug. We sometimes have to take one for the team. We’re giving like that!

Skip this one!

2shay

I only give 4 stars because very early in the book I got an inkling who might`ve killed Hazel. This dimmed a bit the excitement. However I still enjoyed reading the book till the end, because there`re still a few twists that makes the story enjoyable. The growing attraction between Jackson and Katherine was well written and I liked how Debra Jupe displayed the bitchiness of women.