V is for Vengeance (Kinsey Millhone #22)

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

V is for Vengeance (Kinsey Millhone #22)

3.86 of 5 stars 3.86 · rating details · 10,110 ratings · 1,578 reviews

A spiderweb of dangerous relationships lies at the heart of V is for Vengeance, Sue Grafton's daring new Kinsey Millhone novel.

A woman with a murky past who kills herself-or was it murder? A spoiled kid awash in gambling debt who thinks he can beat the system. A lovely woman whose life is about to splinter into a thousand fragments. A professional shoplifting ring working...more

Hardcover, 448 pages

Published November 14th 2011 by Putnam Adult (first published January 1st 2011)

more details... edit details

Get a copy:

More…

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare

Can't Wait Books For 2011

450th out of 1,207 books — 6,934 voters

Best books of November, 2011

22nd out of 72 books — 178 voters

More lists with this book...

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 3,000)

filter | sort: default (?) | rating details

Nov 21, 2011 Francie rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: mystery-thriller, own

YAY! I love these books..but I hate how it takes FOREVER for the next book to come out. I should probably stop reading the books so quickly.

21 likes · like · see review

Nov 27, 2011 Scott rated it 3 of 5 stars

I'll probably write a more fleshed out version of this mini review when the book comes out publicly. For now let me just say this while
it's fresh in my mind:
Sue Grafton books are always interesting - having worked her way from A to, now, V, she has done a great job of developing her protagonist,
Kinsey Millhone.
The plots - well, some grab me more than others. But I have to say having read some but not all of this series that she's definitely
gotten better as an author fleshing our characters more,...more

5 likes · like · see review

Mar 04, 2012 Roberta rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery

I'm so disappointed. One of my reliable sources of relaxation has been wrested from me. Or it could be that I am just tired of the formula. As I read the 22nd book in this series, I was aware of every little plot contrivance. The prose was creaky and almost staccato (and then I got in the car...and then I put my keys in the ignition...and then I turned the key...). The whole by-play of horrible food at Rosie's wasn't cute; it was boring. The whole shabbiness of her turtleneck and jeans; ouch. An...more

16 likes · like · see review

Nov 29, 2011 Kathy rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: crime-thriller, favorite-authors, series, lisa-v, favorites

Sue Grafton is amazingly keeping this series at a level of excellence in this her 22nd novel of the Kinsey Millhone thrillers. The story had great rhythm, moving the story along without any lag. The characters were exciting and well-developed, new ones and old ones. The different characters' storylines came together beautifully. The only complaint I have is that Henry is away looking after his 99-yr-old sister for the duration of the book. A very satisfying read.

5 likes · like · see review

Nov 24, 2011 Beth rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites

Fantastic! There's nothing else you can say about the Kinsey Millhone series by Sue Grafton. Not only are the stories strong and realistic, but the characters are fully realized and three dimensional. You actually feel like you know these people and they are alive and well in the world. The main character of Kinsey is so human and fully developed that you expect to be able to look up Millhone Investigations in the phone book and hire her for a job. These books never get old and tired like some o...more

1 like · like · see review

Dec 19, 2011 Judy Alter rated it 4 of 5 stars

This must be Sue Grafton's 22nd outing in her alphabet series of mysteries featuring P.I. Kinsey Milhone. This one took me a little longer to read--partly because I had a lot of other things, like Christmas, going on but also because it was slow to draw me in. But once I got into it--and once Kinsey appeared on the scene, I was hooked as usual. This is a suspense novel in the classic sense--the reader knows the good guys and the bad guys--and what they're up to. It's just a question of when thei...more This must be Sue Grafton's 22nd outing in her alphabet series of mysteries featuring P.I. Kinsey Milhone. This one took me a little longer to read--partly because I had a lot of other things, like Christmas, going on but also because it was slow to draw me in. But once I got into it--and once Kinsey appeared on the scene, I was hooked as usual. This is a suspense novel in the classic sense--the reader knows the good guys and the bad guys--and what they're up to. It's just a question of when their paths will converge--and Grafton is a master at building complications and suspense. Just when you think there's no relation between this character and that, a small fact makes you realign your thinking. It's finger-nail-biting, read-into-the-night stuff.

Kinsey Milhone doesn't seem to change--if she ages, it's not obvious; she still eats at Rosie's and hangs out with Henry, her spry elderly neighbor who's a great cook. But in this volume Grafton creates some characters of real depth, like Pinky, the petty thief who can't seem to reform and can't seem to win at anything he tries. He's a loser but the reader soon feels Kinsey's concern and, yes, affection, for him. Perhaps the most interesting is the mastermind criminal Dante--don't call him a gangster because he resents that. But he's efficient, almost ruthless, and runs a huge smoothly operating resale business--as in reselling shoplifted and stolen goods. He's also charming, ethical in his own way, and an entirely sympathetic villain if there is such a thing. Dante is the kind of bad guy you find yourself rooting for.

The novel opens, as most suspense novels do, with a series of apparently unrelated scenes. Grafton soon links them, so that you sense what's going on. What bothered me was that I couldn't relate the first scene to the rest of the action until late in the novel--perhaps a more astute reader would pick up on it, but when I finally read what linked it to the plot, I'd almost forgotten that opening scene. Puzzled me a bit.

But Grafton remains a master of her craft. I think she and Kinsey will make it safely through the alphabet, and I look forward to the last letters--Z is for ?????
(less)

3 likes · like · see review

Feb 28, 2013 Ficbot rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2013, mystery

I have been following this series since the beginning, and was happy to at last get caught up on this one. Grafton has for the most part kept up the quality, and has made a smart choice to age her character slowly and keep the stories set in the latter half of the 1980s. It was fun seeing a detective novel being published in this era of internet instant everything spend a chapter going to a library to look at reference books and gazetteers.

With that said, I am afraid I found the mystery only so-...more

like · see review

Feb 23, 2013 Karen rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: kinsey-milhone-series, mystery-thrillers

Kinsey Millhone is about to turn 38. It is 1988 and she is out on a shopping trip at Nordstroms when she observes a shoplifting in progress. Reporting this sets off a chain of events that quickly gets out of control.

If you love action, suspense and great sleuthing this will grab your attention. Kinsey quickly finds herself investigating the supposed suicide of the shoplifter at the request of her grieving fiancee who had know idea what she was into. Meanwhile a lonely woman indulges in an affai...more

like · see review

Dec 27, 2012 Christine Knight rated it 2 of 5 stars

Don't know if it is just me or the book. I always look forward to these, but this one let me down. I thought Grafton took some cheap shots at other writers, and why the hell for? She is very successful, but perhaps she is feeling that there are people biting at her ankles now that the series seems to be approaching 'z' and an obvious endpoint?

There was this shabby little romance story within this novel, with two unbelievable characters. At the start we read about a boy being murdered, and it do...more

like · see review

Dec 16, 2012 Marilyn Maya rated it 3 of 5 stars

Let me start by saying, "I couldn't put it down" but that was after a sorry beginning with a bunch of characters that were either mean or boring. Then as if the author didn't like them herself she started changing and fleshing them out in an unbelievable way. She added a bunch of people and some of them worked and some didn't.
The mystery itself got interesting and I liked a few of the star players like Nora and Dante, though I couldn't see how Nora could be this vindictive mean, petty person an...more

like · see review

Dec 09, 2012 Kkraemer rated it 4 of 5 stars

A former resident of Santa Barbara, I began reading these books as a way to put myself back along that beach, breathing that air. I also found her main character, Kinsey Millhone, very very funny. I liked the little side thoughts she reported as she listened to this person or that (often odd people in and of themselves), and I liked the way the mysteries were paced.

I always wondered about how it would feel, though, to imply that you would write a good mystery for every letter in the alphabet. A...more

like · see review

Dec 02, 2012 Harley rated it 4 of 5 stars

I was shocked to discover that I hadn't listed any of the Sue Grafton alphabet books on my list. I've read them all, most recently this one when it arrived in paperback. So now I've entered all 22 of the books to date. and not reviewed them but given them all 4 stars (which seems to be the average rating). Kinsey Milhone, Grafton's PI, is an old friend by now. I know her routines, I know her friends and neighbors, I know her proclivities to keep pursuing cases beyond reason because of curiosity...more

like · see review

Nov 04, 2012 Cheryl rated it 5 of 5 stars

I haven't read a Kinsey Millhone mystery for many years. I went from A-L back in the day when my single lifestyle was kind of sad like hers. As the following letters came out and my life changed I didn't feel like I wanted to return to her troubles, even vicariously, so I didn't check in until I picked up V at Costco yesterday.

This was a masterful detective novel, which mixes up the usual elements and characters in Santa Teresa with some thought-provoking questions about fatherhood and family an...more

like · see review

Nov 01, 2012 NyiNya rated it 4 of 5 stars

After waiting for V for such a long time, perhaps I expected too much. V is for Vengence is mediocre at best. Still, a mediocre Kinsey Milhone book is not that bad, so if you are a died in the wool fan, you won't miss it no matter what the reviews say. I know I couldn't pass it up.

The book doesn't put Kinsey in the best light. She spots a shoplifter at a department store and rushes to notify security. The shoplifter's body is found at the bottom of "suicide bridge" a few days later, and the dead...more After waiting for V for such a long time, perhaps I expected too much. V is for Vengence is mediocre at best. Still, a mediocre Kinsey Milhone book is not that bad, so if you are a died in the wool fan, you won't miss it no matter what the reviews say. I know I couldn't pass it up.

The book doesn't put Kinsey in the best light. She spots a shoplifter at a department store and rushes to notify security. The shoplifter's body is found at the bottom of "suicide bridge" a few days later, and the dead woman's fiance hires Kinsey to find out if it was suicide or murder. The plot is more complex, but I don't want to be a spoiler. What is kind of odd is Kinsey's morphing into the Avenging Angel of department store security. She goes after the dead woman's partner (including following the teenage daughter around with absolutely no purpose and no resolution...it's like part of the book Grafton stuck in and forgot about). Even when the client fires her, she can't stop following the woman and causing trouble for innocent bystanders. Suddenly she's Police Inspector Javert, obsessed with bringing Jean Valjean to justice. It seems like a big head of steam to get up over something that's not murder or kiddy porn. Yeah, shoplifting is very bad, it costs consumers a lot of money, as we learn because Kinsey keeps harping on it and pouring out statistics, but get a grip Kins. And Get a Life.

The best parts of Grafton's books are those all-too-rare glimpses into Kinsey's personal life. There are none here. Henry, her handsome 90 year old landlord is away again, taking one of our favorite characters off the board. Rosie, who is a gifted if eccentric cook in some books and an awful one in others, is at her worst here. How does she keep the restaurant going when she serves only pigs feet and mutton heads to white suburban middle class clients? Sometimes Sue Grafton can be a bit formulaic, with her descriptions of the all white interiors of those houses in Horton Ravine where the rich ladies with the softly highlighted pagesboys live. You know, the ones with the pale grey wool trousers and the white silk blouse with sleeves rolled to the elbow, showing off the cartier tank watch. Oy already. But in this book, she departs from this script and I was surprised to find myself missing it!

There are subplots aplenty. We have police informants, blackmailers, crooked cops, and a mafioso and his mistress. He runs the shoplifting operation and while Kinsey is hell bent for leather to nail the poor little worker bees, she restrains herself when it comes to Mr. Big. Read the book (you know you will no matter what I say) and see if it doesn't seem a little farfetched to you at the end. Anyway, we get another peek at the handsome and wealthy Police Officer Cheney Phillips with his cashmere sweaters in soft browns and beiges, but he's mostly annoyed with Kinsey and there does not seem to be any spark on his side. She is still cutting her hair with the toenail clippers or whatever, so maybe that explains it. She's a grown woman in her mid 30s. The gamin look doesn't work very well past age 15. By this point, she probably looks either homeless or demented. Plus it seems she has gotten smaller in this book. In earlier novels, she was 5'6" and weighed 118 lbs. Now She is noticably smaller...the word 'vulnerable' was bandied about. Okay she was never amazonian, but not a pipsqueak either. Is Sue Grafton hoping for Julia Roberts to do the movie? Is there going to be a movie? We also meet a lovable burgler and his Dumb Dora With a Heart of Gold ex-hooker wife, unfaithful wives and two-timing husbands, trampy secretaries, moles, family mysteries, family secrets, family murders, jealous brothers, secret passages and the kitchen sink.

V is for Vengence is supposed to give us a look into the high-tech world of global shoplifting. Well, it doesn't. We learn a little, that one booster can pick up a nice load of merchandise, that it is competitive arena and rival gangs fight for territory. There are different levels of operation, from the actual lifters to people who remove tags and sort the loot...which includes everything from drug-store brand skin care items to baby formula, as well as clothing, others who transport the stuff, and warehouses where it is bundled onto pallets and shipped worldwide. And we learn some buzzwords too. It's just not that interesting.

None of it makes this book work. I hope Ms. Grafton is not running out of steam this close to the finish line. I hope we get more of Kinsey's personal life and love life. Where is Robert Dietz, anyway. Has he forgotten Kinsey completely. Heck, at this stage I'd even take that poor sap Jonah Robb back for Kinsey's sake. I'm pretty sure she has not had a romance for at least 3, maybe 4 letters of the alphabet.

By the way, do other readers get frustrated withe the books' setting in the pre-internet/pre-cell phone world? Poor Kinsey schlepps to the library to do research, instead of googling. She needs to use pay phones when she's out on a stakeout! I'll bet there are younger readers who can't imagine living in so primitive a world.

Anyway, let's wait for the next one and hope W does not stand for Wasting our Time.(less)

like · see review

Aug 31, 2012 Lizzie Hayes rated it 5 of 5 stars

‘V is For Vengeance’ by Sue Grafton
Published by Mantle, 5th January 2012. ISBN: 978-0-230-74587-2

PI Kinsey Millhone is shopping in the lingerie department in Santa Teresa, when she sees a woman shop-lifting. Kinsey informs the saleslady, and she in turn calls security. When the woman is apprehended and Kinsey later learns that she is being charged, Kinsey is pleased with a job well done, although she had been aware that the woman was not working alone and her accomplice has got free and clear.

Ho...more

like · see review

Aug 29, 2012 Richard rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: sue-grafton

Wow. Last week, I didn’t like Chelsea Cain’s 4th book and now I don’t like Sue Grafton’s 22nd novel. Maybe this will be a new trend for me. From this point forward, maybe I’ll hate everything I read for the rest of my life and spend the rest of my time on GoodReads writing nothing but scathingly sarcastic, snarky condemnations like those smart ass Amazon reviews. It could be like the second coming of Facebook for me.

Anyway, Kinsey Millhone blows the lid off of a… shoplifting cabal. Two people th...more

2 likes · like · see review

Jul 13, 2012 Carol Rogers rated it 4 of 5 stars

Once again, I really enjoyed this Kinsey Milhone novel and I am pleased to see that the series shows how Sue Grafton is developing into a more modern style.

Saying that, I am sad that there is less about Kinsey's own life in the latter books as I really did enjoy reading about how her frustrations with her cases caused her to clean her apartment and how she was addicted to her morning run. The day to day life made her feel very real and I can't be the only reader who is amazed at how she survives...more

like · see review

Jun 15, 2012 Mark rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Well, Grafton has improved somewhat as a writer as she has trudged through the alphabet. Here she gives us multiple points of view and some omniscience (alternating by chapter), which provides relief from the oppressive first-person narration of EVERY DETAIL IN THE DAY of the ever-perky and often-implausible Kinsey Millhone, gal detective. This one turns out to be acceptable light entertainment. The lack of plausibility is as usual the glaring weakness of the book. Grafton insists on making her...more

1 like · like · see review

May 01, 2012 Jacqueline Corcoran rated it 3 of 5 stars

Kinsey is hired by the boyfriend of a woman who supposedly jumped to her death after a shoplifting charge, which Kinsey instigated after witnessing the woman stealing clothes in a Nordstrum. Kinsey is hired because the boyfriend wants Kinsey to find out if it was true that his girlfriend had a secret life.
As a starter, I found this motive a little bit of a stretch; the guy seemed pretty entrenched in his denial and not the type to spend money on a private investigator. Also, Grafton could do...more

2 likes · like · see review

Apr 10, 2012 Mary rated it 2 of 5 stars

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I enjoyed this book but definitely don't think it is as good as some of Grafton's previous work. There are some parts of the plot that just don't seem to stick together well. The story opens up with Kinsey Millhone witnessing an act of shoplifting. And, even getting involved in reporting and trying to apprehend one of the suspects. Kinsey goes on and on about how bad shop lifting is and the cost to the industry and the consumer. Yet in the end she is befriending the mobster Dante who is the head...more

2 likes · like · see review

Apr 02, 2012 Patti rated it 2 of 5 stars

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. This is the first time that I can honestly say that I wish Sue Grafton had stopped a few letters short. I have read her books since I was in my 20s and I turned 40 on my last birthday; in other words, you could say that Kinsey has "seen" me through law school, law jobs, grad school, teacher school, teaching jobs, marriage, divorce, new relationship, and the purchase of three houses. She has been with me longer than just about any of my friends, and so I appreciate Kinsey, Ms. Grafton and these b...more This is the first time that I can honestly say that I wish Sue Grafton had stopped a few letters short. I have read her books since I was in my 20s and I turned 40 on my last birthday; in other words, you could say that Kinsey has "seen" me through law school, law jobs, grad school, teacher school, teaching jobs, marriage, divorce, new relationship, and the purchase of three houses. She has been with me longer than just about any of my friends, and so I appreciate Kinsey, Ms. Grafton and these book. Therefore, I write this review wearing a big sad face.

On the positive side, I do like the way that Grafton has started branching off and letting other characters narrate. I especially liked the Dante character in this book. He was (or at least seemed) faithful, mildly bothered by his line of work and cursed (or blessed) with a conscious. What could have been a one-note "gangster" in other authors' hands became someone much more complex and ultimately likeable.

The story itself failed to grab me. I'm not sure who wrote the summary for the book, but I found it odd. For instance, of the people who are supposedly connected by this web, one is dead, another's malfeasance doesn't come out until near the end (although I guessed it early on), the "wandering husband" is completely ancillary, the "sinister gangster" is likewise rarely seen and I wouldn't really describe Nora as a "lovely woman"...I don't know. I expected to get to know these people better, given that they were highlighted in the book jacket. That summary just really struck me as bizarre.

Next, I found the Nora character irritating. I have often wondered about women who have no talent, no skills...nothing but a hot ass. How the hell do they get men to take care of them? This bitch was up the creek when her first husband died, yet found an uber rich guy to "take care" of her. That just (as it always does) hit me the wrong way...it could be that I'm jealous, but I'm also honestly curious. How do women DO that?!?

Besides that though, I just didn't find her interesting or worthy of so much focus. I guessed the connection between her and the kid with the gambling debt as soon as she said she lost a child. That made me even less interested in her.

Overall, I just didn't see the "vengeance". From who? The "sinister gangster" who we only saw in passing (until the ending). I also found Grafton's writing dry and tedious. In some parts, she added so much detail that I found myself wondering if she was being paid by the word or needed to stretch the manuscript out.

This is the first book in this series that I can honestly say that I will not read again. I hope that this was just a bad one for me and not indicative of how the final four books will play out.

2.5 stars.(less)

3 likes · like · see review

Mar 26, 2012 Linda rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery-crime

V is for Vengeance has a very effective hook at the very beginning. It's Kinsey's birthday, and she's nursing a broken nose and feeling sorry for herself. It's not until the final chapter that we learn who bashed her. This is one of Grafton's most complex plots, involving three separate stories that gradually merge into one. A few days earlier, Kinsey saw and reported a shoplifter, who was arrested. The scene shifts and we meet a loan shark with a sense of decency, and a woman who is tiring of h...more

2 likes · like · see review

Mar 22, 2012 Gloria Feit rated it 5 of 5 stars

In her twenty-second novel in the “alphabet” series, Sue Grafton has fashioned an immensely pleasurable novel, featuring Kinsey Millhone, p.i. in Santa Teresa, California. The protagonist proclaims that “there are people who believe you should forgive and forget. For the record, I’d like to say I’m a big fan of forgiveness as long as I’m given the opportunity to get even first.” As the title would suggest, this book is all about vengeance.

At the outset Kinsey’s next door neighbor, “bona fide mot...more In her twenty-second novel in the “alphabet” series, Sue Grafton has fashioned an immensely pleasurable novel, featuring Kinsey Millhone, p.i. in Santa Teresa, California. The protagonist proclaims that “there are people who believe you should forgive and forget. For the record, I’d like to say I’m a big fan of forgiveness as long as I’m given the opportunity to get even first.” As the title would suggest, this book is all about vengeance.

At the outset Kinsey’s next door neighbor, “bona fide mother substitute” and some-time assistant/amateur partner in detection, 88-year-old Henry, has to leave town for a short while for a family emergency, so Kinsey is more on her own this time around than usual.

The first page of the second chapter describes the two black eyes and broken nose sustained on Kinsey’s thirty-eighth birthday, on May 5, 1988 [the period when most of the action takes place], and the story behind that shocking birthday present takes about another 400 pages to unfold. But be assured those pages turn quickly, with a jolt or two to the reader along the way.

Things begin relatively innocently enough with Kinsey shopping at a local Nordstrom’s, where she sees a woman apparently shop-lifting several pieces of very expensive merchandise. In the aftermath, when Kinsey follows a woman who she believes is an accomplice, the latter attempts to run her down as she is fleeing the store’s parking lot. And from there things get much more complicated, with the reader encountering terms such as “whips,” “baggers,” “pickers,” and “cabbies” [not in the usual connotation], terms for people in an entire “industry” about which most readers, at least those without criminal tendencies, know little or nothing.

Kinsey’s first-person p.o.v. alternates periodically with some third-person p.o.v. chapters, thoughtfully headed as such. There a few moments of facetious foreshadowing, and much humorous story-telling. By the end all story lines are connected in a well-plotted and altogether terrific novel, leaving the reader only to wonder, and hope, as to what Ms. Grafton will do after the remaining four entries in this series are done. Highly recommended.
(less)

like · see review

Mar 15, 2012 Mel rated it 4 of 5 stars

Reading this book brought me back to what old school amateur detective writing was all about. There was no over-reliance on the gross-out factor; the dead were simply killed, they weren't horrifying edifices to the modern indifference to gore and perversity. There was not an over-reliance on a romantic interlude to keep our main female detective distracted or helped along. Kinsey does it her way, on her own, without being badass or wimpy or chicklit, she's just a person, not a stereotype. In the...more

like · see review

Mar 03, 2012 False Millennium rated it 4 of 5 stars

I was starting to feel that Grafton's books were falling into a "too pat" formula, like Janet Evanovich, but this book dispels that belief. I feel there is a real advantage in her setting her protagonist in the past, and I half wonder, as she ends her alphabet, if we won't find Kinsey on the verge of the new technologies: the internet, cell phones, and all the gee gaws of our lives now. In this book, people are still on land lines with nary a cell phone in site. No tweets. She writes her reports...more

1 like · like · see review

Feb 06, 2012 Kathleen Hagen added it · review of another edition

V is for Vengeance, by Sue Grafton, A-minus, narrated by Judy Kaye, produced by Random Audio, downloaded from audible.com.

Kinsey Milhone goes shopping at a Nordstrom’s sale one day for underpants. She sees two women in the next aisle who seem to be shopping. She thinks the better-dressed one is the clerk helping the other more dowdy-looking woman. But she soon comes to the conclusion that the two are a shop-lifting team. She watches the older woman snatch up two pairs of pajamas, and a teddy and...more

like · see review

Jan 26, 2012 Karen Jones rated it 5 of 5 stars

There's nothing I enjoy more (okay, a few things, but this isn't the place for that kind of talk) than a Kinsey Millhone mystery/crime/romance. This one had everything.

Kinsey is hired by a widower to look into the alleged suicide of his fiancé who was recently arrested for shoplifting when Kinsey caught her stuffing a lace teddy and two pair of silk pajamas in her bag at Nordstrom's. What Kinsey uncovers about the woman's past leads her to more than she ever thought and pulls the reader through...more

1 like · like · see review

Jan 24, 2012 Marilyn Fontane rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: sue-grafton

Having read all 22 of the Kinsey Millhone novels, I am obviously a fan of Sue Grafton, but this is certainly one of the best. Intersperced with Kinsey's investigative report on shoplifter Audrey Vance's death is an omniscient story about crime boss Lorenzo Dante and his violent brother Cappi as well as Lorenzo's relationship to socialite Nora and her unfaithful husband Channing. The two stories are of course interwoven at several points, but even Kinsey never finds out how and when. Interestingl...more

like · see review

Jan 18, 2012 Janet Whalen-Jones rated it 4 of 5 stars

Another fine entry in the Kinsey Millhone canon. Intriguing plot complemented by the minute details of detective work in a world before cellphones and the internet. This series started in the early 1980's set in the present day, and each book picks up right as the last leaves off. Thus, 30 years in real time translates to only about 8 years in Santa Teresa time. Grafton does an exellent job of highlighting tiny details of a time that is just oozing from memory into history. At one point our hero...more

like · see review

Jan 13, 2012 Maureen Casey rated it 3 of 5 stars

This book was OK, I don't think its even close to the best in the series. I'm disappointed because I thought very highly of "U is for Undertow" and in this one, I think most of the characters were shallow, one dimensional, particularly Nora. Most of Nora's actions were borderline unbelievable. Even Dante, who was better fleshed out than the rest, wasn't developed well enough to support some of his behavior- particularly in relation to Nora. I think a few more chapters dedicated to character deve...more

2 likes · like · see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … 99 100 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

topics	posts	views	last activity
The Women's Myste...: Sue Grafton Interview	8	44	May 03, 2013 10:41pm
MY sue grafton interview	8	90	Mar 03, 2013 05:54pm
Goodreads Librari...: ISBN13: 9780230756212	2	16	Feb 04, 2013 12:17pm
The Mystery, Crim...: Sue Grafton Interview	1	10	Aug 07, 2012 05:13pm

combine
Other Editions (31)

More editions...

Genres

Mystery

424 users

Thriller > Mystery Thriller

27 users

Mystery > Crime

27 users

Mystery > Detective

21 users

Adult

12 users

Adult Fiction

11 users

Thriller

8 users

Suspense

8 users

Mystery > Murder Mystery

8 users

Contemporary

6 users

See top shelves...

Readers also enjoyed similar books

Breakdown
by Sara Paretsky
Fatal Error
by J.A. Jance
Coming Back
by Marcia Muller
The Rope
by Nevada Barr
Gun Games: A Decker/Lazarus Novel
by Faye Kellerman

About Sue Grafton

Connect with Sue herself on Facebook! www.facebook.com/suegrafton

Received the Shamus Award, "The Eye" (Lifetime achievement award) in 2003.

Family History:

Father: C.W. Grafton, born 1909, third son of Presbyterian Missionaries, born and raised in China, educated Presbyterian College, Clinton, South Carolina; practicing attorney in Louisville, Kentucky with a 40-year specialty in municipal bonds. Au...more

More about Sue Grafton...

Books by Sue Grafton

J is for Judgment (Kinsey Millhone, #10)

More…

Share This Book

Facebook Twitter Your website

Trivia About V Is for Vengeance

3 trivia questions

More quizzes & trivia...

Quotes from V is for Vengeance

“I know there are people who believe you should forgive and forget. For the record, I'd like to say I'm a big fan of forgiveness as long as I'm given the opportunity to get even first.” — 21 people liked it

“Perhaps when we're forced to forfeit what we own, we lose any sentimental associations. Perhaps pawning our valuables frees us in the same way a house fire destroys not only our worldly goods, but our attachment to what's gone.” — 8 people liked it

More quotes…

title link	preview: V is for Vengeance
avg rating	preview: V is for Vengeance Goodreads rating: 3.86 (10110 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10852027-v-is-for-vengeance?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1311702783l/10852027.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10852027-v-is-for-vengeance?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]V is for Vengeance by Sue Grafton[/url]

V is for Vengeance (Kinsey Millhone #22)

Friend Reviews

Community Reviews

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website