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Bo Bradley #2
Strawgirl
San Diego child abuse investigator Bo Bradley becomes involved in a case of child murder that involves a New Age organization, a ritual murderer, an innocent ten-year-old girl hidden by her stepfather, and Bo's own battle with manic depression
256 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1994
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Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews
October 17, 2017
Q:
"I don't find this hard to believe," Bo whispered to a social worker from the probation department seated beside her, "I find it impossible to believe!""Shh," the woman replied, writing "Satanic conspiracy" in purple ink on a lavender legal pad. "That's how they operate. They know people won't believe it."
(c)
Q:
"You're not going to believe this!" Bo told Estrella when she returned at noon. "I've seen a lot of nuts in my day. I've been a nut in my day. But nothing can touch this overdressed psychologist the department imported from la-la land. The woman's either delusional or she's found the best money-maker since junk bonds. According to her, every school, church, daycare center, even 'the United States government,' is crawling with secret Satanists panting to torture children. Not to mention rock stars, pop bands, and everybody connected to the entertainment industry!"
"Does that include TV evangelists?" Estrella grinned over a steaming cup of instant noodle soup on her desk. The sun streaming through miniblinds over their single window sliced Estrella's braceleted arm with wavy black and white lines.
"I think it includes the Pope," Bo sighed. "But what really bugs me is that this woman is billing enormous consulting fees to stand around in a five-hundred-dollar suit showing pictures of rock bands whose lyrics, if played backward on the wrong speed underwater, may or may not contain messages urging people to sacrifice babies."
(c)
Q:
Bo had hoped never to see the matching bleached lizard three-inch heels again.
(c)
Q:
Bo mentally filed what she'd heard and then stared into her own green eyes in the mirror on the office door. Those eyes didn't always see exactly what everybody else saw. The brain behind them was different, its neural pathways prone to the odd bypass, the occasional derailment. But that brain, her brain, her self, would never cling to an insubstantial fantasy to avoid facing a truth. The realization was centering, like opening the door to a personal integrity she'd known was there but couldn't name. She was pretty tough, she acknowledged, to be able to face a world in which human behavior could not be blamed on a Satan. One tough crazy lady. She wished everyone else involved in the Franer case could say the same.
(c)
Q:
Like barely perceptible cloaks, she removed the personae of psychiatrist, Bolduc Chair in Social Psychology at the Seminaire de Sainte Jeanne d'Arc, and author of the popular self-help series, The Meaning of Your Life, as well as a highly praised biography of the Christian mystic Hildegard of Bingen. When the intellectual trappings of forty years had fallen away, Eva addressed her core being—a mature Iroquois woman.
(c)
Q:
Nothing had been given the woman to uphold her during difficulty. No family or cultural ties, no education, no financial resources. No substance of any kind. The woman was prey to every vagary of emotion, every whim in the shifting winds of her time. When Paul Massieu met Bonnie Franer working the food concession at one of Eva's lucrative self-help lectures in Buffalo, he'd fallen in love with his own need to protect something. A cultural anthropologist specializing in the nineteenth-century United States, he'd seemed to grieve for everything lost in time. Suffrage banners, quart-sized beer bottles, the Elizabethan dialect still spoken on the Outer Banks of North Carolina before a causeway to the mainland was built. Everything lost filled him with a helpless urgency to protect it, save it from an annihilation already accomplished. Bonnie Franer and her daughters had represented a fragility he could protect. Until now.
(c)
Q:
There was in actuality no measurable quality named "sanity." The term could be defined only by its absence or impairment, and even that was subject to wide fluctuations based on social and cultural expectations. Certain patterns of behavior had been given certain names, and certain medications were known to control certain symptoms. But literally no one could define sanity, much less measure it.
(c)
Q:
"If you've got to lurk about in excessive eye makeup," Margot O'Reilly had said one long-past Boston morning, "then I suppose it's best you lurk to some enduring music."
(c)
Q:
"I'm going to lecture you on Charles the Second if you don't produce that coffee," she threatened.
(c)
Q:
"I jog," she informed the sausage.
(c)
Q:
"I run on hypomania all of the time," Bo admitted, nodding. "Even when I'm fine, I'm not like other people. Too much energy, too much arrogance. The lithium takes that away, slows me down. I'm not on it right now.
(c)
Q:
"It is an Iroquois tradition, rather complex. The girls have seen a midwinter celebration. I took them myself. The masks, the 'false faces,' represent things seen in dreams. At midwinter, if someone is ill with unhappiness, they search their dreams for these spirit faces, which are the things they must have in order to survive. When they know, they tell the tribe and the tribe will provide what is needed. A companion or a skill, or something like forgiveness for a wrongdoing. At all the festivals people appear in the crowd wearing these husk masks. They are for insight, for healing. Hannah was trying to heal her sister by drawing a healing mask over her pain."
(c)
Q:
"Take me to your lox!" he boomed genially. "That is, if your name's Bo Bradley."
"I was expecting Demosthenes," Bo told him on the way to the restaurant.
(c)
"I don't find this hard to believe," Bo whispered to a social worker from the probation department seated beside her, "I find it impossible to believe!""Shh," the woman replied, writing "Satanic conspiracy" in purple ink on a lavender legal pad. "That's how they operate. They know people won't believe it."
(c)
Q:
"You're not going to believe this!" Bo told Estrella when she returned at noon. "I've seen a lot of nuts in my day. I've been a nut in my day. But nothing can touch this overdressed psychologist the department imported from la-la land. The woman's either delusional or she's found the best money-maker since junk bonds. According to her, every school, church, daycare center, even 'the United States government,' is crawling with secret Satanists panting to torture children. Not to mention rock stars, pop bands, and everybody connected to the entertainment industry!"
"Does that include TV evangelists?" Estrella grinned over a steaming cup of instant noodle soup on her desk. The sun streaming through miniblinds over their single window sliced Estrella's braceleted arm with wavy black and white lines.
"I think it includes the Pope," Bo sighed. "But what really bugs me is that this woman is billing enormous consulting fees to stand around in a five-hundred-dollar suit showing pictures of rock bands whose lyrics, if played backward on the wrong speed underwater, may or may not contain messages urging people to sacrifice babies."
(c)
Q:
Bo had hoped never to see the matching bleached lizard three-inch heels again.
(c)
Q:
Bo mentally filed what she'd heard and then stared into her own green eyes in the mirror on the office door. Those eyes didn't always see exactly what everybody else saw. The brain behind them was different, its neural pathways prone to the odd bypass, the occasional derailment. But that brain, her brain, her self, would never cling to an insubstantial fantasy to avoid facing a truth. The realization was centering, like opening the door to a personal integrity she'd known was there but couldn't name. She was pretty tough, she acknowledged, to be able to face a world in which human behavior could not be blamed on a Satan. One tough crazy lady. She wished everyone else involved in the Franer case could say the same.
(c)
Q:
Like barely perceptible cloaks, she removed the personae of psychiatrist, Bolduc Chair in Social Psychology at the Seminaire de Sainte Jeanne d'Arc, and author of the popular self-help series, The Meaning of Your Life, as well as a highly praised biography of the Christian mystic Hildegard of Bingen. When the intellectual trappings of forty years had fallen away, Eva addressed her core being—a mature Iroquois woman.
(c)
Q:
Nothing had been given the woman to uphold her during difficulty. No family or cultural ties, no education, no financial resources. No substance of any kind. The woman was prey to every vagary of emotion, every whim in the shifting winds of her time. When Paul Massieu met Bonnie Franer working the food concession at one of Eva's lucrative self-help lectures in Buffalo, he'd fallen in love with his own need to protect something. A cultural anthropologist specializing in the nineteenth-century United States, he'd seemed to grieve for everything lost in time. Suffrage banners, quart-sized beer bottles, the Elizabethan dialect still spoken on the Outer Banks of North Carolina before a causeway to the mainland was built. Everything lost filled him with a helpless urgency to protect it, save it from an annihilation already accomplished. Bonnie Franer and her daughters had represented a fragility he could protect. Until now.
(c)
Q:
There was in actuality no measurable quality named "sanity." The term could be defined only by its absence or impairment, and even that was subject to wide fluctuations based on social and cultural expectations. Certain patterns of behavior had been given certain names, and certain medications were known to control certain symptoms. But literally no one could define sanity, much less measure it.
(c)
Q:
"If you've got to lurk about in excessive eye makeup," Margot O'Reilly had said one long-past Boston morning, "then I suppose it's best you lurk to some enduring music."
(c)
Q:
"I'm going to lecture you on Charles the Second if you don't produce that coffee," she threatened.
(c)
Q:
"I jog," she informed the sausage.
(c)
Q:
"I run on hypomania all of the time," Bo admitted, nodding. "Even when I'm fine, I'm not like other people. Too much energy, too much arrogance. The lithium takes that away, slows me down. I'm not on it right now.
(c)
Q:
"It is an Iroquois tradition, rather complex. The girls have seen a midwinter celebration. I took them myself. The masks, the 'false faces,' represent things seen in dreams. At midwinter, if someone is ill with unhappiness, they search their dreams for these spirit faces, which are the things they must have in order to survive. When they know, they tell the tribe and the tribe will provide what is needed. A companion or a skill, or something like forgiveness for a wrongdoing. At all the festivals people appear in the crowd wearing these husk masks. They are for insight, for healing. Hannah was trying to heal her sister by drawing a healing mask over her pain."
(c)
Q:
"Take me to your lox!" he boomed genially. "That is, if your name's Bo Bradley."
"I was expecting Demosthenes," Bo told him on the way to the restaurant.
(c)
April 13, 2023
Puis-je lui donner un 3.5 ? L'écriture est belle, mais elle se lance doucement, si bien que j'ai été au début tenté de reposer le livre. C'aurait été dommage, d'ailleurs. Des personnages humains et qui évitent eux-même les stéréotypes, écris joliment.
April 2, 2018
I love this series am looking forward to reading the rest of the related books. Only sorry to see she seems to have discontinued stories about Bo Bradley and moved on to other material.
November 27, 2018
Bo’s better company when she’s not in a extreme manic state
June 29, 2020
Another Great Read
Abigail Padgett's Bo Bradley character is very well crafted and complex. Can't wait to read the next installment in this author's series.
Abigail Padgett's Bo Bradley character is very well crafted and complex. Can't wait to read the next installment in this author's series.
May 19, 2022
Another in a unique series with a uniquely gifted 'heroine'. I love all Abigail Padgett's "Bo Bradley" series, and wish there were more books in it. This is my third reading of the series, and they're as good as when I first discovered them.
February 2, 2016
[book:Strawgirl|104128
From the Book
Second in the award-winning Bo Bradley mystery series, STRAWGIRL throws child abuse investigator Bo into the curious world of cults, and pits her against the most loathsome of antagonists.
The rape/murder of a little girl is exploited by a sensation-seeking psychologist, arousing the public to a frenzy of mindless rage toward “Satanists” while Bo struggles to protect the murdered child’s sister and save an unjustly accused man from prison.
Complicating everything is an attractive suitor, Cajun pediatrician Andrew LaMarche, whose proposal in a canoe results in watery disaster. Add new friends Rombo Perry, an ex-boxer, and partner Martin St.John, whose wheat rolls are to die for, plus an ACLU lawyer sleeping on her couch, and Bo sudenly has an entourage!
But both the system for which she works and the real killer are out to get Bo, in a complex case that threatens her with professional ruin… and death.
My Review
This book was just as chilling as the first one. Whenever I think of sexual abuse of a child, my heart just breaks. This book opens with this savage scene and when someone is arrested, you would think that would end it. Yet the author weaves a story that is beyond belief. As I followed Bo on all of the twists and turns, again, confusing at times, I was still interested to see where the story would lead. How the author managed to throw romance and friendship in and make it work I don't understand. This one was not as exciting to me as the first one but it was still a very good story. Again I recommend this for the mature young adult.
From a Christian Perspective
In this book 2, we again see references to an abandoned faith. Interactions with the church and priest are full of anxiety and disbelief. Even in the so-called "confession, " it's apparent that Bo doesn't understand the depths of faith. Maybe it's her mental illness or maybe it's a bad experience but its concerning to see. What would I do if this were a real life situation? I would try to introduce that person to the loving Christ that I know. Who even in the midst of evil that she faces day to day in her job, gives us strength to stand up to the task. He gives us hope, that one day there will be no more evil like we see today and he give us confidence to face the future. The bible tells us that we have sound minds and I believe that with my whole heart. This is the Jesus that I know.
This is a book from my personal collection, all opinions expressed are my own.
Love and blessings!
Margaret
From the Book
Second in the award-winning Bo Bradley mystery series, STRAWGIRL throws child abuse investigator Bo into the curious world of cults, and pits her against the most loathsome of antagonists.
The rape/murder of a little girl is exploited by a sensation-seeking psychologist, arousing the public to a frenzy of mindless rage toward “Satanists” while Bo struggles to protect the murdered child’s sister and save an unjustly accused man from prison.
Complicating everything is an attractive suitor, Cajun pediatrician Andrew LaMarche, whose proposal in a canoe results in watery disaster. Add new friends Rombo Perry, an ex-boxer, and partner Martin St.John, whose wheat rolls are to die for, plus an ACLU lawyer sleeping on her couch, and Bo sudenly has an entourage!
But both the system for which she works and the real killer are out to get Bo, in a complex case that threatens her with professional ruin… and death.
My Review
This book was just as chilling as the first one. Whenever I think of sexual abuse of a child, my heart just breaks. This book opens with this savage scene and when someone is arrested, you would think that would end it. Yet the author weaves a story that is beyond belief. As I followed Bo on all of the twists and turns, again, confusing at times, I was still interested to see where the story would lead. How the author managed to throw romance and friendship in and make it work I don't understand. This one was not as exciting to me as the first one but it was still a very good story. Again I recommend this for the mature young adult.
From a Christian Perspective
In this book 2, we again see references to an abandoned faith. Interactions with the church and priest are full of anxiety and disbelief. Even in the so-called "confession, " it's apparent that Bo doesn't understand the depths of faith. Maybe it's her mental illness or maybe it's a bad experience but its concerning to see. What would I do if this were a real life situation? I would try to introduce that person to the loving Christ that I know. Who even in the midst of evil that she faces day to day in her job, gives us strength to stand up to the task. He gives us hope, that one day there will be no more evil like we see today and he give us confidence to face the future. The bible tells us that we have sound minds and I believe that with my whole heart. This is the Jesus that I know.
This is a book from my personal collection, all opinions expressed are my own.
Love and blessings!
Margaret
June 13, 2013
In STRAWGIRL, Bo Bradley, a social worker employed as an investigator for the San Diego Children’s Protective Services Department is asked “Why do you risk so much? What makes you do what you do?” That is a question many people may ask themselves.
Her response, “Who knows....I have risk built into my chemistry. Any day may bring fears beyond anything real life can produce. It provides a somewhat larger perspective, maybe. Or it may be a pitiable adolescent need to defy authority.”
The Strawgirl refers to Samantha, a murdered three-year-old girl who had been raped and a mask drawn on her abdomen. An anti-cult hysteria, fueled by a prominent speaker warning about Satanism, has inflamed the area and her father, a member of a little-known group, quickly becomes the main suspect. After Samantha’s sister, Hannah, disappears, probably kidnapped by their father, Bo tries to locate them and determine the facts of the brutal murder.
One person she meets, Eva Broussard, the member of the Iroquois tribe and a psychologist, becomes instrumental in helping solve the crime as well as helping Bo deal with her bi-polar disorder.
Abigail Padgett has created realistic characters who act in realistic ways. She exposes the dangers faced by people who may be different from society norms and how that society can be more dangerous because of its own unrealistic fears and its willingness to jump to erroneous conclusions.
Her response, “Who knows....I have risk built into my chemistry. Any day may bring fears beyond anything real life can produce. It provides a somewhat larger perspective, maybe. Or it may be a pitiable adolescent need to defy authority.”
The Strawgirl refers to Samantha, a murdered three-year-old girl who had been raped and a mask drawn on her abdomen. An anti-cult hysteria, fueled by a prominent speaker warning about Satanism, has inflamed the area and her father, a member of a little-known group, quickly becomes the main suspect. After Samantha’s sister, Hannah, disappears, probably kidnapped by their father, Bo tries to locate them and determine the facts of the brutal murder.
One person she meets, Eva Broussard, the member of the Iroquois tribe and a psychologist, becomes instrumental in helping solve the crime as well as helping Bo deal with her bi-polar disorder.
Abigail Padgett has created realistic characters who act in realistic ways. She exposes the dangers faced by people who may be different from society norms and how that society can be more dangerous because of its own unrealistic fears and its willingness to jump to erroneous conclusions.
August 11, 2014
Serious novel
that has real life scenarios. I really like that the main character is bipolar. I'm a therapist & dislike the way her life appears to be so clear & problem free. almost promoting not taking meds. people that are bipolar do stop taking meds for reasons the author explains. unfortunately she doesn't state that each time one goes off them, the meds become less effective. wish the author had written as "I" vs "she" it puts distance between the author & reader. includes a beautiful native American woman character w incredible wisdom I look forward to reading another of this series dislike the cover picture & wouldn't have read if it hadn't been on sale. so glad it was!
that has real life scenarios. I really like that the main character is bipolar. I'm a therapist & dislike the way her life appears to be so clear & problem free. almost promoting not taking meds. people that are bipolar do stop taking meds for reasons the author explains. unfortunately she doesn't state that each time one goes off them, the meds become less effective. wish the author had written as "I" vs "she" it puts distance between the author & reader. includes a beautiful native American woman character w incredible wisdom I look forward to reading another of this series dislike the cover picture & wouldn't have read if it hadn't been on sale. so glad it was!
February 3, 2013
Charity shop find a few years back and i've never found any of her others. This is book two in a series about Bo Bradley who is a child protection social worker with manic depression. According to the blurb, the first volume was the first ever to feature an investigator with manic depression. In this one, a young child dies and an 'expert' is trying to use the case to drum up media attention for satanic abuse and her own book. Bo has to find out the truth, aided by a handsome doctor and a native american psychologist who adopts the dead girl's older sister, before an innocent man stands trial. Well written and lots of interesting plot twists.
November 22, 2014
It had some good writing, but also it read like some editor had told her, your next book needs more sex and violence--the more, the better. Also, the main character's Weltanschauung is just too far from mine to be anything but frustrating: sex is just an itch to scratch that ends most relationships, no use for marriage, no use for religion or for that matter for most religious people, etc. Plus, as in the first book, her conviction that she can tell when she needs her lithium and (more troubling) when she doesn't is factually wrong and probably dangerous to some readers. I'm afraid that, contrary to my published reaction after reading the previous book, now I'm done with Bo Bradley.
January 26, 2013
I didn't like this book as much as her first one in the Bo Bradley series. The story dealt with a child molester turned murderer, which is difficult for me to read. I admire the heroine, as portrayed by the author as a manic depressive personality who hates taking her lithium. She feels more in tune with people and the situations surrounding the cases she works in the Child Protection Agency without taking drugs. She always gets her man. Will probably read the next book in the series.
August 16, 2012
To the best of my knowledge I'm not personally acquainted with someone who has manic depressive disorder. The second book in the
Bo Bradley series is a good story but it's Padgett's insight into the daily life of a manic depressive (and several other mental health issues)
that makes this a really good book.
No sex
the violent murder isn't graphic
Bo Bradley series is a good story but it's Padgett's insight into the daily life of a manic depressive (and several other mental health issues)
that makes this a really good book.
No sex
the violent murder isn't graphic
May 28, 2009
Favorite Quotes:
"The woman was prey to every vagrancy of emotion, every whim in the shifting winds of her time."
"Sometimes it's impossible to understand the up side without comprehension of the depths."
"The woman was prey to every vagrancy of emotion, every whim in the shifting winds of her time."
"Sometimes it's impossible to understand the up side without comprehension of the depths."
June 17, 2011
This is the 3rd book I have read by Abigail Padgett and the 2nd with this character. The storylines are typical of the crime/mystery genre but with the interesting perspective of the main character being bi-polar. Overall, good beach book.
March 16, 2012
Bo is a child protection specialist with the refreshingly different perspective of bipolar disorder. She pursues the mystery of a brutal case of child abuse which is not as easy to solve as it might first appear to be.
October 14, 2012
I love Abigail Padgett's writing, and how she includes politically sensative material, like the stigma of the mentally ill, while composing an intellegent thriller along the way. Bo Bradly is my favorite heroine of all time~!
February 28, 2014
I enjoyed the first Bo Bradley book more than this one. I am not sure if it was the whole story or just the subject that made this one harder to read. I will give the Bo Bradley series the benefit of the doubt and read the next one.
December 29, 2014
Interesting
Not as good as the first book but still worth the effort. Vague on some aspects that should've been explained and expounded on more. Then long winded and rambling at other times.
Not as good as the first book but still worth the effort. Vague on some aspects that should've been explained and expounded on more. Then long winded and rambling at other times.
August 3, 2008
You will need tissues.
November 12, 2012
I only read about 1/3 of this book and could not get in to it. It just never grabbed me at and it's rare that I don't finish a book :(
July 6, 2013
Again I'm stumped. Way too much trying to make the reader understand bipolar instead if mystery yet the plot is interesting. Too graphic violence for me
January 22, 2014
Love Padgett's writing skills, but didn't like the graphic descriptions of the crimes.
March 2, 2014
Enjoyed this one. Loved the Indian culture brought in to the story. Kind of a little wordy in spots but overall I really enjoyed it.
June 25, 2014
good genre fiction, flawed amateur PI with bipolar disorder. It makes bipolar more accessible and less frightening.
December 19, 2014
a perfectly fine sauna read at the gym.
March 13, 2016
More psychological insight into the mind of a manic depressive but also with other mental disorder and people that are just different.
April 27, 2017
Uplifting among the sorrow
Would that we had a thousand Bo Bradley's to champion our children. She's a strong lead for a sensitive subject and I hope Andrew finds a more direct route into her heart.
Would that we had a thousand Bo Bradley's to champion our children. She's a strong lead for a sensitive subject and I hope Andrew finds a more direct route into her heart.
Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews